Fuji-Q Highland is a theme park home to four huge roller coasters, each a record breaker in its own right.
To learn about Fujiyama and Do-dodonpa, the parks first two record breakers, make sure
to watch part one of this two part series by clicking the ‘i’ icon in the top right
hand corner of your screen.
In this video, we’ll explore the rest of the parks roller coaster history, and the
other attractions on offer to guests.
Despite being home to large scale roller coasters, Fuji-Q Highland is actually quite a small park.
Many other amusement parks around the globe have large plots of land to accommodate their massive roller coasters.
Fuji-Q have managed to consistently upgrade their park, removing older rides and replacing
them with newer additions.
This has allowed them to remain small in size,
but has led to an often confusing park layout for visitors to navigate.
Further to this, the newer areas of the park are easy to spot, with nicer looking facades
and more attention to detail.
Interestingly, the nicest area of the park isn’t in the park at all.
An entire French themed town is located just outside the Fuji-Q entrance, and features
some of the best theming in all of Japan.
This land, called La ville de Gaspard et Lisa, includes flower gardens, fountains, a carousel,
and a miniature replica of the Eiffel Tower.
Roughly 4 years after the debut of Dodonpa, the world’s fastest accelerating roller
coaster, Double-loop, the park’s first inverting roller coaster, closed to the public.
Though, like previously, Fuji-Q Highland had something ready as its replacement.
When deciding on what to build next, president of the Fujikyu corporation was quoted saying
he wanted “something ridiculous”.
After experiencing X2 at Six Flags Magic Mountain, he knew his park had to have one too.
As a result, in july of 2006, Eejanaika (pronounced edge-uh-nike-uh), a huge 4D roller coaster
opened to guests.
Built by S&S arrow and standing 76m (249ft) tall, the ride is an absolute monster.
But that’s not even the most impressive part.
As riders navigate the layout their seats spin independently to the track.
Through this, Eejanaika inverts guests a total of 14 times during the course of the ride,
a world record according to the park.
Although, this is heavily disputed as it features only 3 track inversions - far from the world record of 14.
But it is the track itself that controls the rotation of the seats.
If you look closely each track segment has 4 individual rails - 2 support the motion
of the train, while the other 2 control the position of the seats!
At the beginning of the new decade, Zola 7 closed to the public.
Fortunately, Fuji-Q were once again ready to replace it.
They’d already built the world’s tallest and fastest roller coaster, but not the worlds’ steepest.
So, July of 2011, they debuted Takabisha, the world’s steepest roller coaster.
Featuring an angle of descent of 121 degrees, riders climb 43m (141ft) high, before slowly
falling towards the edge of the drop.
Moments later, the trains plummet inwards, reaching the 121 degree drop angle.
But, Takabisha is more than just a one trick pony.
The ride begins in total darkness, all before guests are accelerated to 100kmh (62mph) and
launched directly out of a tunnel.
Then, during the layout, they complete a total of 7 different inversions!
Sadly however, Takabisha no longer holds its only record.
In 2019 a clone of Takabisha named Shellraiser opened to the public, featuring an angle of
descent of 121.5 degrees, stealing the record by only half a degree.
Fuji-Q Highland’s four main roller coasters have become quite the draw.
Fujiyama, Do-Dodonpa, Eejanaika and Takabisha are all impressive record breaking attractions.
Even though they feature little in the way of theming, the rides do have some personality.
The park has created themed soundtracks that are played within the respective attraction’s queue line and station.
Each piece of music is tailor made to the style of the ride.
Fujiyama’s is god-like, Do-Dodonpa’s is intense, and Eejanaika’s is happy.
This helps to build anticipation for the thrilling ride ahead.
Though speaking of this, Fuji-Q Highland has become infamous for their long and slow moving queue-lines.
People have been known to complain about the park’s poor operations which cause even
small queues to be hours long.
With that being said, others contest this reputation, as like many parks the speed of
the operations change on a day-to-day basis.
For international visitors, it also helps that announcements are made in both Japanese
and English, so boarding procedures can be understood.
Aside from roller coasters, the park offers a moderate collection of other attractions.
If you enjoy heights, red drop tower, a 52m (171ft) tall vertical drop tower might be for you.
Or try their Sky Tower Swinger a 59m (194ft) tall ride that swings guests over the top of the park.
If rotating is more your thing, there’s Sky Roller, a spinning ride which puts guests in control.
Riders flap their wings to cause the seats to spin as they rotate in the sky.
And panic clock, a flat ride which rotates 360 degrees, inverting visitors in the process.
Finally there’s Super Pendulum, a frisbee ride themed to the nearby pizza restaurant.
Outside of this is Fuji Airways, the parks flying theatre attraction, giving guests the
sensation of flight around Mount Fuji and the rest of Japan.
If you’re looking to get wet, try shoot the chute, japan’s first rafting ride;
or experience Cool Japan, a 30m (98ft) drop into a bed of water, which soaks riders in the process.
If horror is more your thing, Fuji-Q has you covered too, with two scary attractions.
Endless Haunted mine is a wacky shack in which guests wear headphones as they stumble through
dark passageways, simulating the fear of being alone.
Haunted Hospital on the other hand, “a super scary labyrinth of Fear” as the website
quotes, is a 20 minute walkthrough horror attraction.
For an additional price, guests can navigate a multi-story maze set in an isolated hospital
ward which once conducted human experiments.
Along the way you’ll be terrified by the eerily quiet hallways and the various actors
hiding just behind the corner.
Recently, Fuji-Q announced the debut of an all new roller coaster, planned for the Summer of 2022.
Currently, there’s little information about the new attraction, but what we do know is
it’s set to cost 3.6 Billion Yen, approximately 33 Million USD.
But it’s clear from their past that Fuji-Q Highland will continue to strive to build
new attractions on scale not often seen around the world.
What they lack in theming, they make up for in unique experiences centered around record breaking rides.
For this reason, Fuji-Q has built up a reputation for being Japan’s go-to amusement park,
featuring some of the best thrills in the country - and maybe, the continent.