by Monica Poling
Last updated: 7:42 PM ET, Sat September 16, 2017
Japan has become a well-known destination for its cat cafes, where people can fulfill their dreams of pet ownership-many apartments in Tokyo don't allow pets-by spending time with homeless kitties looking for love.
But now Japan, which is home to more than 150 cat cafes, is taking kitty love to a new level. The cat café train.
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As Atlas Obscura reports, this first-of-its-kind enterprise, a partnership between Kitten Café Sanctuary and the Yoro Railway Co. Ltd., placed 30 rescue kittens with a few dozen passengers on a two and a half hour rail ride.
According to Tokyo-based news site, Rocket 24, there were two rides available. Both departed September 10, one from Ogaki Station to Ikena and then another one returning to Ogaki later that afternoon. The fare was 3,000 yen (about US $27) and included a bento box lunch, sweets and unlimited travel on Yoro Railway for the day. A portion of the fare was donated back to Sanctuary's rescue programs.
Despite the free food on board and the beautiful scenery unfolding just outside the train's picture windows, no one paid attention to either. It was all about the cats said Bruce Adler in an interview with Atlas Obscura.
[READMORE]READ MORE: Cat Cafes to Visit Around the World[/READMORE]
In a Twitter post, Adler called the train "the best place on earth."
Clearly, Adler was charmed by his feline traveling companions.
"They were so light and little and curious about everything," he told Atlas Obscura. "Three kittens circled one woman for nearly the entire ride, clambering all over her. Another passenger spent hours cradling a tiny black cat to his chest."
Total capacity for each ride was 40 people. Not surprisingly, tickets sold out within a day of their release.
There's been no word if a more cat train rides are planned, but given the success of the first experiment, we assume a follow-up has to be imminent.
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