Shonan Monorail SMR03:Shonan-Machiya & SMR02:Fujimicho

The Shonan Monorail links Ofuna in the north of Kamakura to the little island of Enoshima. It opened in 1970 & was the first monorail of its kind in Japan. It’s a pretty fun way to cruise on down to Enoshima, and the stations along its route are the final components of my final daft list from Japan – for the forseeable future, at any rate.

Local Sights

Um… you’re not going to believe this but the only thing to see is …

a park.

All About SMR03 Shonan-Machiya & SMR02 Fujimicho Stations

Shonan-Machiya feels a little more hustley and bustley than previous stations on the Shonan Monorail, largely because of the busy intersection outside the station itself.

There’s a Mitsubishi software development office on one side of that road, and uphill from that is an elementary school. A few apartment buildings and an elderly care facility and well… that’s about it for the station area proper.

But up that same hill, past the elementary school and quite a walk into suburbia you can find another absolutely beautiful park that is more for the locals than for the tourists.

Kamakura Chuo park – or just Central Park, if you’d prefer – is probably beautiful at any time of year. I was fortunate enough to be there in April, when the weather had really started to turn for the better and the carp flags were already out for Children’s Day.

The park itself is tucked into a little natural valley, seemingly scooped out by some benevolent force seeking to create a little dip of a region where nature flourishes and peace prevails. Nothing could be heard save for birdsong, the croaking chants of unseen frogs and chirps and hums from a selection of insects out and enjoying the chance to bask in the vernal sunshine.

That’s about all the park has to offer, but if you ask me, it’s more than enough.

The next station down the line is Fujimicho, which has very little of note to recommend it. It does have a very cool monorail themed Lawson convenience store next door…

… other than that, there’s not a whole lot to report about this station.

Its only other real claim to fame is that it shares a name with a station in Tottori and served as the starting point for an epic, albeit ridiculous, 16 hour cross-country train pass journey experiment, which you may remember from the Fujimicho to Fujimicho entry in the 52 Fujis project.

And with that, we’re down to one final station on one final daft list for the final Friday of 2021 – see you next week… and Happy Holidays!