Sunday Morning Cars in Tokyo – Shake Shack Gaien Meet
When planning this trip to Japan, I knew this wasn’t a “car guy” trip, but there were still a few specific car-related activities I wanted to do. One of them was simply to attend a casual car meet in Tokyo. Probably the most famous of these would be the gatherings held at two different parking areas located in Tokyo Bay: Daikoku and Tatsumi. The major snag with those meets is that they are only accessible by car and taxis won’t pick you up there, so you need to drive yourself. This is a hassle as a tourist, because the meets are at night, meaning you need to find somewhere to park your (rental) car overnight–and virtually none of the hotels in Tokyo offer parking. Not the end of the world, but would it be worth the inconvenience?
The more I looked into it, the more it seemed like that answer was “no”. Not only did I keep finding post after post online about how the Daikoku night meet is no longer what it once was, with the car quality going down and tourist-in-rental quantity going up, but all of my friends who had recently been to Japan corroborated that with firsthand accounts. So how would I scratch my Japanese car meet itch? All of my problems were solved in one fell swoop: introducing the Shake Shack Gaien meet.
If you recall from my Thursday/Friday post, on Friday we visited the Meiji Jingu Shrine which is part of a huge park complex in Shinjuku. Near there is another park complex that features multiple stadiums and another huge park. “Gaien” means “outer park” and that is the area we visited on this lovely Sunday morning. And Shake Shack? Yep, the American fast food chain is there too.
(more…)I Went to Japan Twice (Part 2 – 2026) – Thursday/Friday
This post is part of a continuing series of my trip to Japan. If you haven’t read the other posts I suggest you start there:
When I woke up in my hotel room on Thursday morning at the Fuji Speedway Hotel, the sun was peeking through the clouds. Maybe the rain shower had passed and we’d have a dry day. Maybe we’d finally be able to see Mt. Fuji!
(more…)Every PS1 Game – Dino Crisis
Back in the 1990’s, two seemingly unrelated things gained mainstream popularity: dinosaurs and survival horror games. What would happen if you combined Jurassic Park, Steven Spielberg’s blockbuster movie from 1993, and Resident Evil, Capcom’s smash hit game from 1996? You’d get something like Dino Crisis, released in 1999.
Shinji Mikami of Capcom was the director of Resident Evil (1996) and producer of Resident Evil 2 (1998) and 3 (1999). In between RE2 and RE3, Mikami-san directed and produced this game, Dino Crisis. While the Resident Evil series announces its title when pushing Start, sadly Dino Crisis does not. A sign of a less campy direction for this series, perhaps?
(more…)Yearly Treat: Cars and Coffee at Ford Greenfield Labs 2026
Every weekend there are “cars and coffee” meetups held all over the world. Getting together on a Saturday or Sunday morning with your friends to sip coffee and talk cars has become a staple of modern car communities, with many clubs organizing monthly meets. In major population centers, chances are you can find a car meet every single weekend. But what about a meet that only happens once a year?
Nestled near the foothills of Palo Alto, California, is Ford’s Greenfield Labs. Silicon Valley is a hotbed for automotive research centers like these: Ford, Nissan, Tesla, Toyota, and VW all have engineering centers in the area, just to name a few. Every once in a while, Ford opens their doors and invites the public to show off their cars and check out Greenfield Labs.
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Star Road 