#2025-08

One of the three One Piece Shinkansen sets (700 Series) departs Shin-Iwakuni bound for Shin-Ôsaka, with a 500 Series waiting to continue West for Hakata.

Finally, another cat-themed train: Aizu Railway's AT-551 unit is the "Nyan-tabi tetsudô" special, for the cat staff at Ashinomaki Onsen station.

The Hachinohe line's highlight is getting near the sea between Samekado Lighthouse and the rocky coastline. A JR East local KiHa 130 passes in the early afternoon.

Kôriyama (0 km), 9:00 AM. This is a crossroad station, where the Ban'etsu line from Aizu to Iwaki and the Suigun line meet the Tôhoku main line, the artery from Tôkyô to the North. The Tôhoku Shinkansen passes above the ground-level lines giving us a view of the depot. From the front to the back: a JR Freight EH500 articulated loco, a KiHa 110 Diesel unit, and a GV-E197 ballast transport. That last one is a recent addition to JR East's track work fleet, and uses Diesel units at each end of a train of hoppers instead of locomotives. Would love to hang around (and picture the elusive H5 Shinkansen), but the train leaves at 9:18.

Between Kawahigashi (20 km) and Izumigô (27 km), we follow the Abukuma river. Above, we can just glimpse some railing between the rice paddies and the river: that's a cycle road. Below, we get the view out the front, which we can often do in Japan. Actually, after leaving Kôriyama, the train stopped suddenly, with some bloke in the carriage shouting "uso da!". Passengers gathered at the front to see what had happened, and so did I, but I didn't notice anything out of the ordinary. We were stopped for a few minutes and got underway again.

Iwaki-Asakawa (45 km), 10:24 AM. Below, we see the board welcoming us to the small town of Asakawa. It looks nice, and has a claim to fame as the home of pathologist Yoshida Tomizo (1903-1973), who contributed to proving that cancers could be induced by prolonged exposure to certain chemicals. It also has a big firework display on 16 August which is... tonight. Oh bo#ocks.

The last stop in Fukushima prefecture is Yamatsuri-yama (75 km), 11:07 AM. Now following the Kuji river, the train stops at a rather picturesque location, with the Ayunotsuri pedestrian suspension bridge looking very inviting for a hike in the area. But I have to decline, despite getting flashbacks to Tônohetsuri near Aizu that I'd visited the day before. I'll have to stop in the area another time!

Also on Hokkaidô, the Suzuran express operated by a silver 785 series arrives at Shiraoi under a silver sky.

On a brighter day, the OG Kyushu Shinkansen, the 800 series (my fourth-favourite Shinkansen of all time), arrives at Kurume on an all-stop Tsubame service.

JR Shikoku's first tilting DMU was the 2000 series, which we will cover in the next post, but we have already seen some trains derived from the type: the JR West KiHa 187 and Chizukyû HOT 7000. This is JR Shikoku's further development: the N2000. The resemblance, particularly in the carriage side profile, is noticeable. Pushed away from the main non-electrified routes by the newer 2700s, the original 2000s and N2000s can be seen on the extension of the Yosan line, South of Matsuyama, on Uwakai express services.

Up North now! Hokkaidô is a very large and sparsely populated region of Japan, so while the Shinkansen serves the Southern city of Hakodate and is due to reach the capital Sapporo in 2030, the rest of the island doesn't necessarily need as much intensity. So there are plenty of non-electrified lines, and the way to speed up trains in that case is by building tilting DMUs. JR Hokkaidô achieved this in 1992 with the KiHa 281 HEAT - for "Hokkaidô Experimental Advanced Train".

The original KiHa 281s were recently retired, but development had continued, up to the most recent KiHa 261 seen above. This is JR Hokkaidô's flagship express, the Hokuto, serving the Hakodate-Sapporo route that will eventually be replaced by the high-speed line extension.