On my recent trip to Japan I knew I had to visit the mysterious Sonic the Hedgehog statue in the woods in Iga, Mie prefecture. The statue used to be part of Sega World Kadoma which closed down around 2006-2007. It was going to be thrown out but Ryoji Kotera decided to save the statue by taking it to his villa. Kotera decided to place it aside a signpost so that people could find his residence easily. In 2017, Kotera had passed away, the statue is now the responsibility of his family.
The statue first came into the public eye in 2015 when a biker posted a picture of his bike next to it on twitter. However the biker did not know its exact location, only the prefecture. The statue was in disarray at the time, but in 2020 the Kotera family asked a contractor to repair it before an upcoming festival. The repainting was documented on twitter.
The first time I heard of the statue it was that some people had found it on Google Street View, but they refused to give the location. Later a fan in the area found the location and it was given cultural landmark status on Google Maps shortly after, making it much easier for us to find.
Getting an international drivers license was pretty straightforward and the drive through the countryside was beautiful, but a little nerve racking. Lots of tight single lane narrow roads in the woods. Luckily the actual location of the statute has a turnout where you can park your vehicle. We got lucky since on our way up there it was raining pretty hard but it magically stopped when we got to the blessed statue and managed to take a bunch of pictures before the rain started up again. It is much smaller than I expected and the new paint job is holding up nicely.
If you wish to visit the statue yourself, the location is J56R+JHH, Iga, Mie 518-0216, Japan. I hear you can get a taxi but it is much better to drive there yourself.
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