Day 16 - Ghibli Park, Nagoya - July 10

Studio Ghibli creates anime films like Spirited Away and Howl’s Moving Castle. My family has watched many of them. So today we went to Ghibli Park, which is a theme park of sorts, focused on the movies. It doesn’t have rides but rather recreates scenes and buildings as a way to experience the Ghibli universe. And note that this is different from Ghibli Museum, also extremely popular and sells out in minutes, but that is in Tokyo and we weren’t lucky enough to get tickets.

It’s located on the site of expo 2005 which includes much more than Ghibli Park. It has sports fields, skating rinks, Japanese Gardens and more. I didn’t realize this but the venues are scattered throughout the park so I was awfully confused as to where to go when we got there. Some are far apart and there is a bus system to take you between them. It was 35 degrees without a cloud in the sky so my family almost melted. 

Highlights

Mononoke Village

Valley of Witches

Ghibli’s Grand Warehouse

This was everyone’s favorite in part because it was indoors. There were lots of places for photos.

While everyone took a break I went on a hike that had a look out of Nagoya. Another gigantic city by Canadian standards.