Onsen amusement park where visitors are clad only in towels may soon be a reality

The world's first onsen amusement park where visitors parade around in nothing but bath towels may soon be a reality.

You read that right - an amusement park that revolves around sweaty bodies, spas and hot springs. Who wouldn't want that?

That is, if a hilarious concept video for the project can be trusted.

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Beppu City in Ōita Prefecture, Japan, is famous for its hot springs, and its mayor wants to capitalise on that with an "amusement onsen city initiative".

In a Youtube video posted on Sunday (Nov 20), mayor Yasuhiro Nagano declared that works to build a 'spamusement park' (spa-amusement park, geddit?) would commence when the video hits a million views.

The video finally clocked over a million views four days later on Nov 24.

With the world's highest yield of hot-spring water and eight major hot spring areas, Beppu has mother nature on its side.

The elaborate concept video gives a peek at how the 'spamusement park' will look like: Towel-clad visitors strolling around leisurely, sitting on traditional theme park rides modified to fit onsen tubs.

[embed]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UbMmhQYoAsM[/embed]

Osen or not, it sounds ridiculous already to take rollercoaster rides in bath towels, but trust the Japanese to bring your wildest ideas to reality.

Japanese blog RocketNews24 reported that Beppu city's Rakutenchi amusement park was specially modified to create the video, with 150 'calefares' hired for the filming.

Even the local fire department was roped in to transport over 12 tonnes of spring water to the amusement park.

Rides such as the carousel and roller coasters were filled with hot-spring water, raising the temperatures for an extra adrenaline high.

Sky trams and ferris wheels cabins were also fitted to contain the hot-spring water.

In the meantime, before the 'spamusement park' becomes a reality, you can settle for an onsen experience (albeit with fewer thrills) right here in Singapore.

grongloh@sph.com.sg