Coinciding with our visit to Gamagōri in the Achi Prefecture is the docking of the pirate ship The Thousand Sunny from the popular Japanese manga series One Piece. As someone who is oblivious to the world of manga, I was fortunate to have gotten a quick recap about the story of the ship from a fellow travel writer Mica, who has previous knowledge about the series. According to her, the Thousand Sunny is the ship acquired by the Straw Hat Pirates—a group of misfits comprising the lead characters of One Piece—that figured prominently in both the manga volumes and the adapted anime series.
Making a port of call at the marine resort and theme park of Laguna Ten Beach, the Thousand Sunny takes visitors on a scenic cruise around the bay surrounded by fancy yachts and towering amusement park rides.
The interior of the ship is as fanciful as its playful exterior design. Bursting with popping colors and visually-arresting corners filled with replicas of items one would see in an anime series such as One Piece, being onboard this pirate ship kind of transports you into the pages of a manga book. As much as I enjoyed being inside the Thousand Sunny, I’m pretty sure kids and hardcore manga/anime fans would be five-folds more delighted boarding the ship.
Staying true to the anime version of the ship, the real-life Thousand Sunny also has various rooms such as: the boys and girls rooms, a kitchen, an aquarium bar, a library, a sickbay, Franky's workshop and Zoro's training room.
The bigger-than-life-sizes statues of the characters can be also seen inside standing on the different parts of the ship. My favorite of course, is Monkey D. Luffy, the leader of the Straw Hat gang.
The cruise took almost an hour and for the most part, we just chilled at the open dock feeling the soothing wind and watching dozens of birds flying-by our ship. The clear sky made up for a beautiful day and in the world of the Straw Hat Pirates, it would be a good day to explore the manga series' four seas composed of the North Blue, East Blue, South Blue and West Blue.
It was a fun experience going out on a brief cruise aboard a peculiar ship patterned after its original design from the anime—a Carrack, type of ship—complete with an observation tower, a slide, swing and a lawn deck.
So, who are your favorite One
Piece characters?
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