Having lived in Japan for two years, what I'd add to this is to spend a lot of time walking, if physically able.
For example, in my opinion the best way to explore Tokyo is to simply leave your hotel in the morning, wander around all day, and stop anywhere and everywhere that looks interesting. The excellent mass transit system means that it won't be a problem to get back.
In more rural parts of Japan, there are signposted walking trails. Here are three which I highly recommend, in whole or in part.
These places are wondrous for their natural and human-made beauty, and have tons of temples, shrines, and historic sights along the way. I strongly second Patrick's advice to get out of the big cities, and virtually anywhere you go you will find much that is beautiful.
Tokyo is absurdly gigantic, I would not suggest randomly walking it. Also the subway system can be challenging, and the staff don't speak English, so if you get stuck they likely won't be able to help.
Another random thing about the train system: there are women-only cars. I didn't realize this until I had already boarded and (as a man) I was absolutely mortified.
I'm not sure when this post was originally written, but at a quick glance I can see some mentioned stores/restaurants that have since unfortunately shut down (like Deus Ex Machina which I used to frequent when it was in Harajuku but has since moved about 45 minutes away to Asakusa). This might not be the most up-to-date resource if you're visiting Japan in the future.
Also, this list specifically recommends the APA hotel chain, whose president leaves copies of his revisionist history book denying the Nanking Massacre in their hotel rooms, often in foreign languages[1]. There are quite a few nationwide hotel chains in Japan like Dormy Inn and JR METS as well as thousands of independents, most of which are listed on price comparison websites and will come in around the same cost as a room at APA. Please consider supporting another hotel, ideally a local one, before APA :)
* Dormy Inn (almost always has a bath on the top floor!)
* Candeo hotels (same!)
* M's hotels (there are many variations on the "M's" name)
* Unizo
* Smile hotel
* Hotel mystays
* Hotel livemax
* Daiwa Roynet
...and tons of others that are less universal. While there are subtle differences between them (e.g. some have better beds, others have laundry facilities, some have public baths on the top floor), virtually all "business hotels" have the same set of features, down to the layout of the rooms, and can usually be had for $50-$100 a night. That said, they are small, and you will not be happy if you're the kind of tourist who lugs multiple large suitcases everywhere you go, or if you're seeking a "luxury" experience.
Business hotels are cheap places to crash for a night and little more.
Even if you don't care about APA being a very weird business, the other chains that OP recommended are simply better. Cleaner, nicer, better service.
Avoid APA at all costs, especially outside touristic areas. APA is used by everyone for all things, legal or not, and the state of your room may vary wildly.
If I may, I would also like to recommend Richmond and Route Inn here. I have been to the Richmond in Sendai and Morioka in Tohoku on three different occasions. The best thing is that no one wants to take a copy of my residence card, which to the best of my knowledge (statement from the MHLW) they are not supposed to ask you for anyway, but a lot of hotels do ask and then suggest you go find another place if you don’t want to comply.
APA hotel isn't a great choice for most (American) tourists anyway - the rooms are extremely small. Most customers seem to be solo Japanese businessmen.
> the boom in tourism in Japan over the last decade or so has made the beaten path… less than wonderful
It's not just Japan. I've been travelling a lot for many years, for work and pleasure, in Asia, Europe, and Latin America. In this time, the experience has become consistently much worse everywhere I go. I personally blame social media and camera phones for this. In the past, a place might be busy, but people were mostly enjoying the place which is all good. Now it's all about people taking the same photo 100 times with slightly different poses. Wannabe influencers using their boyfriends as personal photographers. Youtubers being loud and not caring whether you want to be in their video or not. The list goes on. I'm definitely jaded but between that, airport insanity, and recently covid measures, travelling has never sucked more than it does today.
Looks like a lot of gatekeeping on your part. This was the good old days when you were travelling but now that other people travel, they are the worst because they take too many selfies.
Negative impact of tourism have been documented for a while. There’s just more people traveling because flights got cheaper. But new travellers aren’t worse than you were, there’s just more of us traveling and it makes our impact more jarring.
As another long term resident of Tokyo (10 years and counting), I honestly can't understand why Patrick would recommend anyone give their business to APA Group.
Unfortunately, I think there are class of travelers (and ex-pats) who simply don't care about history or the current state of affairs. They travel to places for the picture. For Japan, many people stop at the soft power and pop culture. Chinese celebrities have gotten in trouble for posting on social media their visit to political controversial shrines. In those cases, I don't even think it's out of malice or making a political statement, but plain ignorance.
Having accidentally stayed there before, I can confirm that they have their weird in-house magazine, even translated to English, in every hotel room. Even more obnoxious than the Gideon bible.
This "avoid the beaten path for tourists" but also "pick Kyoto". Hmmm.
If you really do want to go (slightly) off the beaten path, try Yokohama (a short hop from Tokyo), Kobe (rebuilt and revitalized since the ruinous earthquake, Fukuoka, Nagano (Winter Olympic city) or Sapporo. Or even take a domestic flight down to Okinawa and visit Naha.
To go off the beaten track in Tokyo, stay in Ikebukuro an unfashionable but IMHO awesome Tokyo hub. For amazing coffee there check out the insanely superb Mermaid Coffee Roasters and its stunning top two floors featuring the owner's curated furniture. Add their knock out baked goods and you won't want to leave. Minami-Ikebukuro park is a nice spot to relax on bright days (next to Blue Bottle coffee) though avoid the in-park Racine's Farm to Table and check out their sister Vietnamese restaurant Raindrop on the trendy Azuma street. Also be sure to walk further along Azuma to the Toden-Zoshigaya Station of the Tokyo Sakura tram line, the last surviving tram in Tokyo, and take it all the way to the Minowabashi terminus and explore the adjacent covered arcade for a taste of old Tokyo.
> This "avoid the beaten path for tourists" but also "pick Kyoto". Hmmm
People conflate Kyoto with the Gion + Kinkaku-ji + Arashiyama + Fushimi Inari. Kyoto city is much wider than that, and every street, especially in the Gion, is dense with history. There's dozens of bridges crossing the Kamogawa river, but most tourists are likely crossing over the one at Gion-shijo. Most tourists don't even stray 1km away from there to see there are stones you can hop over the water with. Sanjo bridge, the first bridge north of Gion-shijo, has sword marks on it from a famous shinsengumi battle. Kyoto, like Jerusalem or Rome, is filled with history on every block. Nearby Sanjo bridge is the temple where Nobunaga Oda was ambushed and forced to commit suicide. Also nearby is a random milestone during the day but at night a fortune teller sets up a shop claiming to channel the spirit of a politician who was assassinated in the exact spot. Most tourists and even Japanese locals would not ever notice the network of mahjong gambling dens hiding in plain site throughout Kyoto city, even in the subway station, but that's not going to be obvious from Google Maps, AtlasObscura, or what have you.
Obviously I'm biased because our startup is based in Kyoto and the company name is based on the Kamogawa river.
If you walk literally fifty meters in any direction from the tourist hotspots in Kyoto you’ll get an entirely different view of Kyoto, often including a reflection of the charms that brought people to the hotspots.
YMMV; I only lived there for a year and it was a long time ago now.
This is interesting, but not great Japan advice. I just went and had a blast and did the opposite of his advice. I think people are different and want different things and don't feel bad if you just want to see the standard Japan checklist. His talk of everyone being surly..you know what, be respectful, everyone in Japan is so polite and nice that you will be happy with the level of service everywhere.
I've been many times and there is a time to venture out and there is a time to enjoy what everyone enjoys and both are fine.
Yeah, I have spent a year in Japan and visited most prefectures and disagree with the article. Of course you should get off the beaten path, but if you avoid it like the article recommends, you will have a much worse time.
Additionally, the advice to visit Gifu is terrible. I spent a week in and around Gifu-shi per Patrick's advice years ago and, while the area is charming as the article states, it is not somewhere you should visit before seeing a dozen other places.
Lovely. Spent 3 months in Kyoto in 2020, at the beginning of the pandemic, and loved Japan, more than my other quick business trips in the past.
Some of my notes, specific to Kyoto, but unsure whether they also apply elsewhere:
Typical food in KYOTO:
- aristocratic kaiseki ryori course dinners
- vegetarian shojin ryori of monks
- simple obanzai ryori home style cooking
- Kyo-wagashi (Kyoto sweets)
- Yudofu (tofu cooked in hot broth vinegar sauce) - try it at Yudofu Sagano. It is famous for tofu kaiseki in Arasihayama
- Yuba (tofu skim)
- Nishin soba: It is a local herring fish soba noodle dish with flavored soy sauce broth. The herring fish perfectly smoked with into sweetness and salty tastes
(eat it at Matsuba Soba)
RESTAURANTS in KYOTO you should try if you have the budget for it (expensive, but not REALLY expensive): Cenci (Italian fusion, 1-star Micheln): http://cenci-kyoto.com/menu (I am Italian, I can tell you that this restaurant is a gem)
What about Kyoto vs Tokyo? Is there also the "small city" experience (calmer streets, slow people) in those cities, in places away from the center, perhaps?
1. Driving is on the left and the lanes are narrow. UK visitors will have no problem; Americans will find it trickier.
2. Japanese police have zero tolerance and complete discretion w.r.t. driving under the influence. Just don't do it; drinking even one beer and then driving is enough to get thrown in jail. And you do not want to get thrown in jail in Japan.
Going off the beaten path always amuses me a bit as advice (what happens when everyone decides to do that?) but it's also quite true that you can often be literally tens of metres away from the most touristic locations with barely any tourists actually around you in most places (exceptions include cities that have become theme parks like Venice).
I’ve been 18 times and I had a good chuckle at this story and the comments. All largely inaccurate. Especially the bits about APA and Kyoto.
Y’all reek of FOMO and exoticism. Chill.
Just go with it. You’ll be fine. Live your normal life, just in a different place. You can gaijin smash through anything if you’re a jerk. If you’re not, I’m sure you’ll find a way to be less shitty as a tourist and someone will appreciate it at the time - and forget about it the next day.
My favourite dining experience was going to Savoy and leaving it to the staff to make whatever they’d recommend. おすすめは何ですか? They have a pizza that’s not on the English menu. A woman from Boston sat at the counter and annoyed absolutely everyone in the restaurant with her loud, obnoxious behaviour, poor Japanese accent, and “I’m the main character” vibes. Classic Roppongi.
This is somewhat adjacent for which I apologize, but being a Japan Fan of the travelling variety I have noticed a trend on HN toward Japan related articles. My understanding is HN has no user-specific algorithmic feed changes, so is this just a natural increase in interest toward Japan in general I'm seeing since the borders opened up? Most of the articles aren't even travel related, just about Japanese culture or people from Japan.
I have not read the whole blog, but at least one critical part of it is already out of date.
The bit about the Japan Rail Pass, in particular the statement "and which you must purchase before you get here".
This is no longer the case. In the run-up to the Olympics, Japan made serious improvements in relation to the JRP:
1) You no longer need to purchase it abroad. You can purchase it in Japan on presentation of your passport with your visitor visa label. Yes, you will pay a small (10%) premium for buying in-country, but the point is the "abroad only" requirement is no longer there.
2) The whole "queue and stamp" palaver to get seats is no longer a thing. The whole "queue and show" palaver to get through the gates is no longer a thing. You now get a ticket which you can use at the machines to get your reservations. You now get a ticket which you can use at the automated gates. If you have never been to Japan before, I can't tell you how FRIGGIN AWESOME an improvement this is over the historical way of doing things !
I actually like the "queue and stamp" and "queue and show"!
First, because queues were usually short. For showing the JR pass, usually no queue at all, sometimes faster than the automatic gates. For reserving seats the experience has always been great, even as a non-Japanese speaker. The guy will find you the time, changes, etc... will ask you if you want to be together as a group, smoking or non-smoking cars (if that's still a thing), etc... and will find what's best for you taking into account what's available, often in less than a minute. I have never had an experience like this with a machine, not even close.
Maybe you travel mostly at rush hours, where the queues can get longer, but no "palaver" for me, everything has been as efficient as it could be. Generally I find machines to be strictly worse than competent staff, and the JR staff is among the best.
Basically, they use the entire dynamic range. 3 stars for "as expected" is eminently sensible, but the west and especially the US suffers so much from review inflation that you could really remove 2 if not 3 stars of a 5-star scale: either a reddit/hn-style up/down, or possibly have a middle-ground "at expectations".
I'm 3 days away from my return flight after spending a month in Japan (I'm here for the first time). I regret leaving the cities. Now I'm back in Tokyo and I feel back at home.
My trip was: Tokyo, Kyoto, Osaka, Kobe, Hiroshima, Miyakojima, Tokyo. Miyakojima, except being tropical "paradise-like island" made me _finish_ two games on my phone.
For context I’m an American born to a British expat who has family from Birmingham down to London, Exeter, Reading and Cornwall. I have been to the UK 30-40 times and spent considerable time (spans of weeks) in England outside London both in other cities as well as countryside over the last 40+ years.
I’d tell tourists to start with and stay in London unless they’re on an unusually long trip. It’s the second greatest city in world history and all, the rest of the country is pretty drab by comparison.
Assuming we are talking about England. Scotland and Ireland are another story.
This is quite true, I've found. I have a very extensive pinned map of the UK that I share with people and most of the really interesting places are outside of London.
The same situation for people visiting the US and they only ever go to some major US city like New York City or Los Angeles. Visit some place that's more than 100 miles from the ocean and isn't an urban downtown center.
Can't resist taking this opportunity to link to my favourite ever piece of travel writing, about Huis ten Bosch: the enormous theme park near Nagasaki where the theme of the park is Holland.
I’m not sure about the off the beaten path as general advice. There’s people who will always go off the beaten path because that’s what they do. Getting around and finding things to do in large cities is much easier than rural ones.
I love going to onsens and the best ones are off the beaten path and usually vary hard to get to without access to a car. (If you’re into driving Japan is a lot of fun. I particularly like driving along the coastline through the Atami Ito area. Mountain driving with steep incline/declines and switchbacks is also fun.)
In small towns there’s often just one central train station and everything else is by bus, taxi, or car. Buses and taxis are terrible options so it basically leaves driving. While it’s easy to rent a car I don’t think it’s a realistic option for most travelers.
While there’s things to do in small towns it’s often a lesser experience. Shops and restaurants close earlier and there’s less variety. It’s a lesser experience than what you’d get in a major city.
Moreover there’s tons of things to do on the outskirts of large cities. Take Koedo (小江戸) as an example. You often don’t have to go very far out for a different experience and still have all the accessibility of the city.
Get change (coins) and try things from vending machines - particularly, the hot milk tea on a cold morning, but be prepared to carry your trash all day until you get back home. Try foods in supermarkets or convenience stores, especially weird candy. Bring Google Translate to use live translation mode. If you're not sure if your phone has the right bands for high speed internet, or how to get a sim card, you can rent a phone, though a dude in a suit will come deliver it to you and make you sign the contract. Eat a giant bowl of curry rice at a curry rice place where you choose your order from a giant ticket dispensing machine. Make a friend and join them at an Izakaya. In Tokyo, definitely go to Golden Gai and do karaoke in a tiny bar. The Miyazaki Museum requires advanced tickets and is usually sold out. If you go to Hiroshima, do not miss the Peace Memorial Museum, Miyajima Island, the cherry blossoms, or the okonomiyaki.
For some more inspiration, James May of Top Gear experienced the not-standard-tourist-stuff of Japan, although some of it is "he's from TV so he has access to things mere mortals don't": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-JzeSxx0LC4
It's also charming to see Tokyo/Japan in the background of some Japanese YouTubers' videos, e.g. this one where they try to walk from a station to another but have to stop at every convenience store and roll a dice to get something: https://youtu.be/_yT32QAyv6s
I have also lived in Japan for almost all of my adult life (age twenty-six to my current sixty-five), and the recommendations on the linked page all look good to me—better than any that I would be able to give. He has obviously travelled more around Japan than I have.
Just two comments:
He recommends APA Hotels, but the couple of times I stayed there the rooms were unpleasantly small—around twelve square meters. There was barely enough empty floor space for a single suitcase. I try to choose hotel rooms with at least eighteen square meters. (Some commenters here have raised other issues with APA Hotels.)
He says nothing about COVID. While people in some countries are talking about the pandemic in the past tense, not in Japan. Around a hundred thousand new cases and a hundred and fifty deaths are being reported each day, with numbers rising again. In just the past couple of weeks, I’ve heard from three acquaintances who have recently gone through rather serious cases. Almost everyone is wearing masks, especially indoors. Because of my age, I continue to work only from home and to avoid crowded places. I will be getting my fifth vaccination in a couple of weeks.
The restaurant and drink recommendations in this post are... not great. I do agree that you want to aim for places that don't cater to tourists, but it's honestly pretty easy to give specific recommendations if you're into food and/or drinking.
In the past 5 or so years, the craft beer and craft gin scenes have been really blowing up. I highly recommend seeking those while you're here.
For ramen it's totally acceptable to go to the popular places. I'd actually generally avoid the advice from the post. You probably don't want to go to the places that cater to salarymen, because they're looking for a cheap place that's open late. Avoid places like ippudo and ichiran, but for the most part, if it has a crazy amount of reviews on google maps or tabelog, and isn't a chain, it's probably really good.
Otherwise I really like extensively trying izakayas. There's so much variety, from cheap salaryman places, to expensive spots that cater to foodies. Some specialize in sashimi, others yakitori, and lots of izakayas seem to take the jack of all trades approach. The hardest part of the izakayas is that they tend to have their menus on the walls, on wooden or paper signs for each dish, making it pretty difficult if you can't read japanese.
[+] [-] impendia|3 years ago|reply
For example, in my opinion the best way to explore Tokyo is to simply leave your hotel in the morning, wander around all day, and stop anywhere and everywhere that looks interesting. The excellent mass transit system means that it won't be a problem to get back.
In more rural parts of Japan, there are signposted walking trails. Here are three which I highly recommend, in whole or in part.
Yamanobe Road: https://www.japan.travel/en/destinations/kansai/nara/the-yam...
Kyoto Trail: https://kyoto-trail.net/trail_course_e.html
Shikoku Henro-Michi: https://www.henro.org/shikoku-pilgrimage/map
These places are wondrous for their natural and human-made beauty, and have tons of temples, shrines, and historic sights along the way. I strongly second Patrick's advice to get out of the big cities, and virtually anywhere you go you will find much that is beautiful.
[+] [-] throwawaaarrgh|3 years ago|reply
Another random thing about the train system: there are women-only cars. I didn't realize this until I had already boarded and (as a man) I was absolutely mortified.
[+] [-] TEP_Kim_Il_Sung|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] roobs|3 years ago|reply
Also, this list specifically recommends the APA hotel chain, whose president leaves copies of his revisionist history book denying the Nanking Massacre in their hotel rooms, often in foreign languages[1]. There are quite a few nationwide hotel chains in Japan like Dormy Inn and JR METS as well as thousands of independents, most of which are listed on price comparison websites and will come in around the same cost as a room at APA. Please consider supporting another hotel, ideally a local one, before APA :)
[1] = many sources, see: https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2017/01/25/national/despit... https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/ryanhatesthis/book-foun...
[+] [-] timr|3 years ago|reply
Other major business hotel chains:
* Toyoko Inn
* Dormy Inn (almost always has a bath on the top floor!)
* Candeo hotels (same!)
* M's hotels (there are many variations on the "M's" name)
* Unizo
* Smile hotel
* Hotel mystays
* Hotel livemax
* Daiwa Roynet
...and tons of others that are less universal. While there are subtle differences between them (e.g. some have better beds, others have laundry facilities, some have public baths on the top floor), virtually all "business hotels" have the same set of features, down to the layout of the rooms, and can usually be had for $50-$100 a night. That said, they are small, and you will not be happy if you're the kind of tourist who lugs multiple large suitcases everywhere you go, or if you're seeking a "luxury" experience.
Business hotels are cheap places to crash for a night and little more.
[+] [-] bluepizza|3 years ago|reply
Avoid APA at all costs, especially outside touristic areas. APA is used by everyone for all things, legal or not, and the state of your room may vary wildly.
[+] [-] justusw|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] valenterry|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rjh29|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] zerocrates|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] wirthjason|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] teerak|3 years ago|reply
It's not just Japan. I've been travelling a lot for many years, for work and pleasure, in Asia, Europe, and Latin America. In this time, the experience has become consistently much worse everywhere I go. I personally blame social media and camera phones for this. In the past, a place might be busy, but people were mostly enjoying the place which is all good. Now it's all about people taking the same photo 100 times with slightly different poses. Wannabe influencers using their boyfriends as personal photographers. Youtubers being loud and not caring whether you want to be in their video or not. The list goes on. I'm definitely jaded but between that, airport insanity, and recently covid measures, travelling has never sucked more than it does today.
[+] [-] jeromegv|3 years ago|reply
Negative impact of tourism have been documented for a while. There’s just more people traveling because flights got cheaper. But new travellers aren’t worse than you were, there’s just more of us traveling and it makes our impact more jarring.
[+] [-] therealdrag0|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] distantaidenn|3 years ago|reply
As others in this thread have mentioned, this hotelier group is abhorrent. They are led by an anti-Semitic, anti-Korean, anti-Chinese history revisionist. The hotel leaves its disgusting diatribe in their company issued magazines conveniently laid out in every room within their hotels. This is just the tip of the iceberg: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/APA_Group_(Japan)#Controversy. Here's another link: https://www.ft.com/content/d35ec458-df07-11e6-86ac-f253db779....
Given Patrick is a long-term resident of Japan, it's shocking to me that he isn't aware of this, or he simply doesn't care.
For anyone reading this, please do not support that company. It may seem a small thing, but this ruined the entire tone of the post for me.
[+] [-] diceduckmonk|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] justusw|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sammy2255|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] paulette449|3 years ago|reply
If you really do want to go (slightly) off the beaten path, try Yokohama (a short hop from Tokyo), Kobe (rebuilt and revitalized since the ruinous earthquake, Fukuoka, Nagano (Winter Olympic city) or Sapporo. Or even take a domestic flight down to Okinawa and visit Naha.
To go off the beaten track in Tokyo, stay in Ikebukuro an unfashionable but IMHO awesome Tokyo hub. For amazing coffee there check out the insanely superb Mermaid Coffee Roasters and its stunning top two floors featuring the owner's curated furniture. Add their knock out baked goods and you won't want to leave. Minami-Ikebukuro park is a nice spot to relax on bright days (next to Blue Bottle coffee) though avoid the in-park Racine's Farm to Table and check out their sister Vietnamese restaurant Raindrop on the trendy Azuma street. Also be sure to walk further along Azuma to the Toden-Zoshigaya Station of the Tokyo Sakura tram line, the last surviving tram in Tokyo, and take it all the way to the Minowabashi terminus and explore the adjacent covered arcade for a taste of old Tokyo.
[+] [-] diceduckmonk|3 years ago|reply
People conflate Kyoto with the Gion + Kinkaku-ji + Arashiyama + Fushimi Inari. Kyoto city is much wider than that, and every street, especially in the Gion, is dense with history. There's dozens of bridges crossing the Kamogawa river, but most tourists are likely crossing over the one at Gion-shijo. Most tourists don't even stray 1km away from there to see there are stones you can hop over the water with. Sanjo bridge, the first bridge north of Gion-shijo, has sword marks on it from a famous shinsengumi battle. Kyoto, like Jerusalem or Rome, is filled with history on every block. Nearby Sanjo bridge is the temple where Nobunaga Oda was ambushed and forced to commit suicide. Also nearby is a random milestone during the day but at night a fortune teller sets up a shop claiming to channel the spirit of a politician who was assassinated in the exact spot. Most tourists and even Japanese locals would not ever notice the network of mahjong gambling dens hiding in plain site throughout Kyoto city, even in the subway station, but that's not going to be obvious from Google Maps, AtlasObscura, or what have you.
Obviously I'm biased because our startup is based in Kyoto and the company name is based on the Kamogawa river.
[+] [-] patio11|3 years ago|reply
YMMV; I only lived there for a year and it was a long time ago now.
[+] [-] latchkey|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] wittyusername|3 years ago|reply
I've been many times and there is a time to venture out and there is a time to enjoy what everyone enjoys and both are fine.
[+] [-] mysecretaccount|3 years ago|reply
Additionally, the advice to visit Gifu is terrible. I spent a week in and around Gifu-shi per Patrick's advice years ago and, while the area is charming as the article states, it is not somewhere you should visit before seeing a dozen other places.
[+] [-] simonebrunozzi|3 years ago|reply
Some of my notes, specific to Kyoto, but unsure whether they also apply elsewhere:
Typical food in KYOTO:
- aristocratic kaiseki ryori course dinners
- vegetarian shojin ryori of monks
- simple obanzai ryori home style cooking
- Kyo-wagashi (Kyoto sweets)
- Yudofu (tofu cooked in hot broth vinegar sauce) - try it at Yudofu Sagano. It is famous for tofu kaiseki in Arasihayama
- Yuba (tofu skim)
- Nishin soba: It is a local herring fish soba noodle dish with flavored soy sauce broth. The herring fish perfectly smoked with into sweetness and salty tastes (eat it at Matsuba Soba)
RESTAURANTS in KYOTO you should try if you have the budget for it (expensive, but not REALLY expensive): Cenci (Italian fusion, 1-star Micheln): http://cenci-kyoto.com/menu (I am Italian, I can tell you that this restaurant is a gem)
[+] [-] swah|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] riko41|3 years ago|reply
- Rent a car, better yet, rent a cheap camper van[1]. Save a ton of money on hotels.
- Get a local 4G internet card. Save on roaming charges.
- Set the option to "Avoid tolls" and "Avoid motorways" on your favorite navigation app. Slower, cheaper and much better scenery.
- Sleep on Road side stations(free and safe), bath on hot springs, wash your clothes on funny laundrettes.
- Use an app[2] with offline mode and content in English.
[1]https://www.japancampers.com/
[2]https://apps.apple.com/us/app/michi-japan-road-guide-offline...
[+] [-] dreamcompiler|3 years ago|reply
1. Driving is on the left and the lanes are narrow. UK visitors will have no problem; Americans will find it trickier.
2. Japanese police have zero tolerance and complete discretion w.r.t. driving under the influence. Just don't do it; drinking even one beer and then driving is enough to get thrown in jail. And you do not want to get thrown in jail in Japan.
[+] [-] mysecretaccount|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] bigDinosaur|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ianpenney|3 years ago|reply
Y’all reek of FOMO and exoticism. Chill.
Just go with it. You’ll be fine. Live your normal life, just in a different place. You can gaijin smash through anything if you’re a jerk. If you’re not, I’m sure you’ll find a way to be less shitty as a tourist and someone will appreciate it at the time - and forget about it the next day.
My favourite dining experience was going to Savoy and leaving it to the staff to make whatever they’d recommend. おすすめは何ですか? They have a pizza that’s not on the English menu. A woman from Boston sat at the counter and annoyed absolutely everyone in the restaurant with her loud, obnoxious behaviour, poor Japanese accent, and “I’m the main character” vibes. Classic Roppongi.
She didn’t get the secret pizza.
[+] [-] ehnto|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] traceroute66|3 years ago|reply
The bit about the Japan Rail Pass, in particular the statement "and which you must purchase before you get here".
This is no longer the case. In the run-up to the Olympics, Japan made serious improvements in relation to the JRP:
[+] [-] GuB-42|3 years ago|reply
First, because queues were usually short. For showing the JR pass, usually no queue at all, sometimes faster than the automatic gates. For reserving seats the experience has always been great, even as a non-Japanese speaker. The guy will find you the time, changes, etc... will ask you if you want to be together as a group, smoking or non-smoking cars (if that's still a thing), etc... and will find what's best for you taking into account what's available, often in less than a minute. I have never had an experience like this with a machine, not even close.
Maybe you travel mostly at rush hours, where the queues can get longer, but no "palaver" for me, everything has been as efficient as it could be. Generally I find machines to be strictly worse than competent staff, and the JR staff is among the best.
[+] [-] hinoki|3 years ago|reply
No kidding, I see lots of reviews like: food is tasty, service was friendly, price reasonable. 3 stars.
[+] [-] masklinn|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pyb|3 years ago|reply
Same situation for visitors to the UK. I've given up trying to tell tourists to get out of London, they never listen.
[+] [-] kissiel|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] CPLX|3 years ago|reply
I’d tell tourists to start with and stay in London unless they’re on an unusually long trip. It’s the second greatest city in world history and all, the rest of the country is pretty drab by comparison.
Assuming we are talking about England. Scotland and Ireland are another story.
[+] [-] wyclif|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mlindner|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] simondotau|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ianpenney|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] simonw|3 years ago|reply
https://spikejapan.wordpress.com/2011/01/23/huis-ten-bosch-o...
Seriously: read the whole thing. There's a bit where bankers take investing advice from a psychic ceramic toad. It's wonderful.
When we visited Japan we made a special trip there and it was every bit as amazing as this article makes it out to be.
[+] [-] wirthjason|3 years ago|reply
I love going to onsens and the best ones are off the beaten path and usually vary hard to get to without access to a car. (If you’re into driving Japan is a lot of fun. I particularly like driving along the coastline through the Atami Ito area. Mountain driving with steep incline/declines and switchbacks is also fun.)
In small towns there’s often just one central train station and everything else is by bus, taxi, or car. Buses and taxis are terrible options so it basically leaves driving. While it’s easy to rent a car I don’t think it’s a realistic option for most travelers.
While there’s things to do in small towns it’s often a lesser experience. Shops and restaurants close earlier and there’s less variety. It’s a lesser experience than what you’d get in a major city.
Moreover there’s tons of things to do on the outskirts of large cities. Take Koedo (小江戸) as an example. You often don’t have to go very far out for a different experience and still have all the accessibility of the city.
[+] [-] throwawaaarrgh|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] netsharc|3 years ago|reply
It's also charming to see Tokyo/Japan in the background of some Japanese YouTubers' videos, e.g. this one where they try to walk from a station to another but have to stop at every convenience store and roll a dice to get something: https://youtu.be/_yT32QAyv6s
[+] [-] tkgally|3 years ago|reply
Just two comments:
He recommends APA Hotels, but the couple of times I stayed there the rooms were unpleasantly small—around twelve square meters. There was barely enough empty floor space for a single suitcase. I try to choose hotel rooms with at least eighteen square meters. (Some commenters here have raised other issues with APA Hotels.)
He says nothing about COVID. While people in some countries are talking about the pandemic in the past tense, not in Japan. Around a hundred thousand new cases and a hundred and fifty deaths are being reported each day, with numbers rising again. In just the past couple of weeks, I’ve heard from three acquaintances who have recently gone through rather serious cases. Almost everyone is wearing masks, especially indoors. Because of my age, I continue to work only from home and to avoid crowded places. I will be getting my fifth vaccination in a couple of weeks.
[+] [-] ryan_lane|3 years ago|reply
I have a pretty extensive list for Tokyo: https://wanderlog.com/view/mhwjfphqda/tokyo-guide/shared
In the past 5 or so years, the craft beer and craft gin scenes have been really blowing up. I highly recommend seeking those while you're here.
For ramen it's totally acceptable to go to the popular places. I'd actually generally avoid the advice from the post. You probably don't want to go to the places that cater to salarymen, because they're looking for a cheap place that's open late. Avoid places like ippudo and ichiran, but for the most part, if it has a crazy amount of reviews on google maps or tabelog, and isn't a chain, it's probably really good.
Otherwise I really like extensively trying izakayas. There's so much variety, from cheap salaryman places, to expensive spots that cater to foodies. Some specialize in sashimi, others yakitori, and lots of izakayas seem to take the jack of all trades approach. The hardest part of the izakayas is that they tend to have their menus on the walls, on wooden or paper signs for each dish, making it pretty difficult if you can't read japanese.