The Ruins of the Tokyo Olympics 2020 / 2021… will come soon, no doubt about it. Unless they cancel the event on very, very short notice. But for now we’ll deal with The Ruins of the Nagano Olympics 1998 – of which there are surprisingly few as most venues are still in use.
The first abandoned place connected to the Nagano Olympics that I am aware of is an abandoned hotel, used to accommodate the curling teams as their event was held at the Kazakoshi Park Arena in Karuizawa; about 80 kilometers southwest of Nagano and the first town to host events for both the Summer Olympics and the Winter Olympics as the Tokyo Olympics 1964 outsourced the equestrian events to the popular resort area. Unfortunately I wasn’t aware of that fact back then, to me it was just a random abandoned hotel with high security (warning signs for both camera and personnel everywhere!). If I would have known I’d probably have pushed harder to get some better photos, especially since one side of the hotel apparently featured the Olympic Rings. And abandoned Olympic Rings always make for a good photo! Unfortunately I was inexperienced, exploring solo and running out of time… so I guess we’ll all have to live with the results. Still better than the original plan of heading back to the train station directly without making the little detour. 🙂
The other abandoned place connected to the Nagano Olympics was a rather small public gymnasium – apparently there were no events there, but it was rather close to two actual venues, so it was most likely used for athletes to exercise and warm up before their competitions. This location I found by chance when I was strolling around town. “Oh, an abandoned looking strange building, let me have a closer look!” The front was closed tightly, but like every good man I appreciate a nice back, so I sniffed around a little bit. One locked door and a couple of blocked ones by large, heavy pieces of furniture to the left – but on the right side I spotted some kind of side entrance. A bit nervous due to some cars coming and leaving at the lot in front of the building I tried to make my way to the most likely locked door across some elevated gravel area when all of a sudden my right leg sank into the ground almost up to my knee. The area I was passing wasn’t solid gravel – it was a pile of melting snow somebody put a thin layer of gravel on top, (almost?) like a friggin trap! As I suffered extremely painful ankle and knee injuries in the past and since there was no guarantee that the side door would allow entrance to the otherwise locked building, I called it a day and was about to leave when I saw a large sign next to some stairs. It featured the Nagano 1998 logo, including the Olympic Rings – not as good as on the building directly, but better than nothing…
Two vastly different locations, explored almost ten years apart. Not the most spectacular ones, but the timing is just right. 🙂 *If you crave more Olympic Ruins, please have a look at my article about the Olympics Ruins of Sapporo 1972.*
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Abandoned Kansai 
I really have always appreciated your artistic approach to photography. You are brilliant. Only thing you’ve got missing on your resume in my opinion is a book or two so I can keep them on my coffee table to look at.
Been reading for almost 10 years. Keep up the great work. You are doing this haikyo stuff on a level that nobody else has done in my opinion.
Thank you very much, Elias – for your kind words as well as for being a reader for such a long time! It’s been a wild ride and an end is not in sight, although everything has been slowing down a bit. But I keep exploring and I’ve just been to Hokkaido last week, where I saw a couple of amazing places solo while being eaten alive by countless nasty bugs…
I’m sure there will be a photo book one day. Right now I am still hoping for a “real” one by an established publisher. But if everything fails I’ll probably self-publish one at the end of my exploration career – unfortunately I just don’t have the time right now to organize such an intense project. It’s not just compiling a book and getting it printed, it’s more about selling it… shipping and taxes, and all those little things that make book publishing a full-time job better left to professionals. 🙂
cool :). i find it kinda interesting that olympics are allways such a big deal, but once its over, it kinda is over for alot of places where it took places. this, the one in sapporo from your old post, and i seen some others from all over the world such as athens too…kinda crazy when you think about how much it typically costs to build these places lel
To be honest: I am not a fan of the Olympics at all! During the 2006 Winter Olympics I still was a student in German and just finished all my tests and had no classes for a few weeks, so I watched tons of competitions, but since then I’ve realized what a corrupt organization the IOC is, and what damage the games usually do to the hosting cities. When Tokyo got the games in 2013 I thought it was the worst idea ever, and that was long before Covid. So those games turned into a much worse clusterfuck than I could have ever imagined and I just hope that Tokyo has to pay for this charade by itself and doesn’t drag the rest of the country into this. (Like Fukushima ruined electricity prices in all of Japan, although the grid in Western Japan is basically independent from the one one in Eastern Japan, where Fukushima is…)
yeah, i dont really care for it either, especially the summer ones, the winter ones atleast have somewhat interesting disciplines lol. but generally, basically only time when i watched it was in the pre “pc with internet” era when there was nothing better in tv, or at my old work where all i did was watching tv anyway hahaha
I agree with Elias, you have a gift with your photography – quite artistic (even when you have subjects you’re not too wild about… haha). And following your link to the 1972 Sapporo Olympics site was a treat as well – in particular seeing the rings on the structure. Enjoying your talents for many years now. Keep up the great work!
Thanks a lot, maclifer! Unfortunately blogs are a dying medium, but I refuse to go social media only. I like whole galleries of photos, I like shorter and sometimes longer rants, I like the idea of visiting a website and not just flipping through 50 photos from 40 sources on the phone while waiting for a train. I know the looks of this blog are rather stale and the presentation could be a lot better, but I still enjoy the idea of delivering a whole meal with each posting, not just a snack. You keep reading them, I’ll keep writing them… 🙂