Hello buns!
As you may well know, I visited Japan for the second time this year and I feel like I learnt new things and experienced things that I didn't the first time round. I've been asked a lot of things about my trip to Japan and been asked for tips for planning a trip there. Let me share some (hopefully) useful tips and some things I had wished I had known before I had gone.
I hope that some of this helps you., happy planning!
Keri, aka Ichigo Bunny
xoxo
I had read somewhere that you need to tightly plan your trip to make the most out of it. You don't, unless you are going for a week and want to cram in as many things as possible.
If you know where you want to stay, look up things to do in that area or nearby and make a list. Note if it is shopping, a cafe, a temple or a shrine you want to visit (although this is handy to do even if you aren't sure of where you want to stay). It will help you roughly make plans for the day and the evening, and it will be useful to take with you in case you forget about one of the places you think you want to visit. I personally found this helpful for when I was spending two weeks in Tokyo and couldn't remember all of the places that I wanted to visit in one area.
Don't know where you want to go? Spend a lot of time researching. Note places that you want to visit, and what area they are in. This is how I planned my first trip to Japan. I had made so many lists, and then narrowed it down to 3 main areas to stay: Osaka, Kyoto and Asakusa, Tokyo. This way can be super helpful for working out how many nights you want to stay in each area, and how much travelling around you may end up doing. You may want to visit certain tourist spots, but not realize the distance between them until you look on a map and see how much time you will spend travelling there.
Once you have an idea of where you want to stay, you can start looking at hotels!
This all depends on if you are travelling around, or staying in one area. For my first trip my mum and I bought a rail pass and used that. We bought our rail pass from https://www.japan-rail-pass.co.uk and found the whole process incredibly straight forward and easy to use. You buy it online before your trip, and then exchange the ticket they send to you in the post at the airport that you land in. It is handy for when you plan on travelling long distances or will be travelling a lot as you can use this pass on the shinkansen (bullet trains). You can use your JR pass at most stations, but note- it doesn't cover the northern region (at least when I last checked). You can get a pass for 7 days, 14 days or 21 days, and they can be a little pricey so make sure that this is definitely the right pass for you. This was incredibly helpful for us as we were travelling from Narita to Osaka, from Osaka to Kyoto, and then from Kyoto to Tokyo. We were able to use this pass at all of the stations within Tokyo that we visited, including Harajuku, Shinjuku and Akihabara. They don't cover the buses or the subway, however.
You can get regional passes that cover smaller areas for a cheaper price. I've never bought one of these but I imagine that they are similar to the JR pass. There are 7 different regional passes that you can buy, and these cover from the north down to the south. The passes are called Kansai, East, Hokkaido, Kyushu, West, Shikoku and Central and each pass covers 3 areas (eg: The Kansai pass covers Nara, Osaka and Kyoto). The passes range in price (at the time of looking) starting from £15 for the Kansai pass, and the East pass starting at £177. The prices will vary depending on how may days you will be buying your pass for. The website does also include brief information about travelling within each region.
A suica card is a credit card sized card that works like an oyster card. You pay for it, and it gets sent to you with some money already put on the card (roughly 1300 yen if I remember right?). It is incredibly useful if you are planning on staying within Tokyo, as you can use this on the trains and on the underground service as well. You literally tap in and tap out from station to station, and it will tell you how much is left on your card as you do both. It's a really easy way to keep an eye on how much you have left on your card as well! It's dead easy to top up, and you can find these machines in pretty much every station. The machines have a little button to translate it to English for you, making the whole process much easier. I used this for my stay in Tokyo, however it may well be worth thinking about getting one if you are travelling around and staying in a place that doesn't have a JR station. I stayed in Asakusa in Tokyo on my first trip, and this area doesn't have a JR station so my mum and I found ourselves having to buy a ticket to a certain zone before being able to use our pass, which can get a little confusing!
You can find all of these passes that I have mentioned above on https://www.japan-rail-pass.co.uk, and this is the website that I have bought both my rail pass and my suica card from. The website will flash a box up on your screen (after a little time has passed) to help you work out what you need. All you do is need to input your email address and it is pretty helpful if you have looked and are still unsure of what you need. I have used this myself, and I did find it helpful.
As you may well know, I visited Japan for the second time this year and I feel like I learnt new things and experienced things that I didn't the first time round. I've been asked a lot of things about my trip to Japan and been asked for tips for planning a trip there. Let me share some (hopefully) useful tips and some things I had wished I had known before I had gone.
I hope that some of this helps you., happy planning!
Keri, aka Ichigo Bunny
xoxo
Do I need to do some rough planning?
I had read somewhere that you need to tightly plan your trip to make the most out of it. You don't, unless you are going for a week and want to cram in as many things as possible.
If you know where you want to stay, look up things to do in that area or nearby and make a list. Note if it is shopping, a cafe, a temple or a shrine you want to visit (although this is handy to do even if you aren't sure of where you want to stay). It will help you roughly make plans for the day and the evening, and it will be useful to take with you in case you forget about one of the places you think you want to visit. I personally found this helpful for when I was spending two weeks in Tokyo and couldn't remember all of the places that I wanted to visit in one area.
Don't know where you want to go? Spend a lot of time researching. Note places that you want to visit, and what area they are in. This is how I planned my first trip to Japan. I had made so many lists, and then narrowed it down to 3 main areas to stay: Osaka, Kyoto and Asakusa, Tokyo. This way can be super helpful for working out how many nights you want to stay in each area, and how much travelling around you may end up doing. You may want to visit certain tourist spots, but not realize the distance between them until you look on a map and see how much time you will spend travelling there.
Once you have an idea of where you want to stay, you can start looking at hotels!
Should I stay in a hotel and what are they like?
This is completely up to you. I stayed in hotels both times I have been to Japan, but I would stress the importance of doing your research and seeing what is best for you. There are many different types of hotels: love hotels, themed hotels, capsule hotels, ryokan (traditional Japanese inn) and your standard hotels similiar to what you get back at home. I would recommend looking for places that are close to a station or bus route but are close to areas that you may want to explore. Trip Advisor will help you out, I used this a lot when I was looking for places to stay in. There are some hotels that will be advertised as a hotel but are like an apartment that you can rent, complete with mini kitchen and house slippers. Please be aware that some ryokans may not allow you to stay in if you are tattooed (due to Japanese cultural views about tattoos). Also, be prepared for the hotel rooms to be smalll! Japanese hotel rooms tend to be smaller than the hotel rooms in Western countries.
I have listed the hotels that I stayed in, what areas they were in and the distance from the train station.
Hotel Keisei Narita -Ekimae
Location: Narita
This hotel was easy to travel to from the airport as they have a free bus service to it, which drops you off at a hotel across the road. It's really close to the station and there's an escalator to the left of the front of the hotel that takes you up to the station or it is a ten minute walk through the town if you turn right. The staff were super friendly, and there are restaurants nearby and a Lawson (convenience store) just outside of the hotel. The hotel room was a pretty big size for a Japanese hotel.
Sarasa Hotel Shinsaibashi
Location: Osaka
This hotel is a ten minute walk from the subway, and about a 5 minute to the main shopping street and Dotonbori Street. The staff are friendly here, and you can leave your luggage there on the day you check out if you want to do some shopping before you leave. The hotel room here was a little smaller than the room in Narita, but still a decent size.
Japaning Hotel Kiyomizu Gojo
Location: Kyoto
This particular hotel was a ten minute bus journey from the station, and the bus stop is on the main road. Alternatively, it is a half hour walk from the station. This hotel is a little difficult to find. It's off the main road and down what looks like a neighbourhood street, with no obvious signs outside it. The lady that runs this is really kind, she stayed there for an extra hour to welcome us and didn't complain when we rang and explained that we were running late. This hotel is more like a self-catering apartment, but I loved that! It is a ten minute walk from Gion which is one of the perks of this location, and there are beautiful shrines and temples near by. Fushimi Inari Shrine is roughly 40 minutes away if you are walking, which is another perk to this hotel. There is a Lawson at the top of the road, and with Gion nearby there are restaurants within walking distance, or alternatively there is a whole floor full of restaurants at Kyoto station. The room is a decent size as it's a bedroom and living room all in one.
Hotel Wing International Select Asakusa Komagata
Location: Asaka, Tokyo
This hotel is either close to the subway or far way from it, it depends on what exit you come out of as you leave the station. It's close to Tokyo Skytree, the main town area where there are shops and restaurants, and there is also a shrine that is a short walk away. There is a rooftop that you can sit on and gaze out from, which is really cool! The room was INCREDIBLY tiny here, the beds are raised so you can slide your suitcase underneath and the only seating here is the bed you sleep on.
Hotel Gracery Shinjuku
Location: Shinjuku, Tokyo
The hotel is about a 10 to 15 minute walk from the station, again it depends on what exit you take. It is easy to find once you are nearby. It has a massive Godzilla on the top of it and the hotel itself is on top of a cinema. The entrance is around the other side of the cinema. There is a bar not even a minute away from the entrance which I fully recommend you going there at least once for a quiet beer, and there are so so many restaurants and activites going on throughout the night here! If you want to party or drink the night away, this is the right area! The staff are polite and helpful here, and the room is pretty small but it does include a decent sized bathroom.
What is better suited for my holiday, a Railpass or Suica card?
This all depends on if you are travelling around, or staying in one area. For my first trip my mum and I bought a rail pass and used that. We bought our rail pass from https://www.japan-rail-pass.co.uk and found the whole process incredibly straight forward and easy to use. You buy it online before your trip, and then exchange the ticket they send to you in the post at the airport that you land in. It is handy for when you plan on travelling long distances or will be travelling a lot as you can use this pass on the shinkansen (bullet trains). You can use your JR pass at most stations, but note- it doesn't cover the northern region (at least when I last checked). You can get a pass for 7 days, 14 days or 21 days, and they can be a little pricey so make sure that this is definitely the right pass for you. This was incredibly helpful for us as we were travelling from Narita to Osaka, from Osaka to Kyoto, and then from Kyoto to Tokyo. We were able to use this pass at all of the stations within Tokyo that we visited, including Harajuku, Shinjuku and Akihabara. They don't cover the buses or the subway, however.
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| My JR pass that I used for my first trip |
You can get regional passes that cover smaller areas for a cheaper price. I've never bought one of these but I imagine that they are similar to the JR pass. There are 7 different regional passes that you can buy, and these cover from the north down to the south. The passes are called Kansai, East, Hokkaido, Kyushu, West, Shikoku and Central and each pass covers 3 areas (eg: The Kansai pass covers Nara, Osaka and Kyoto). The passes range in price (at the time of looking) starting from £15 for the Kansai pass, and the East pass starting at £177. The prices will vary depending on how may days you will be buying your pass for. The website does also include brief information about travelling within each region.
A suica card is a credit card sized card that works like an oyster card. You pay for it, and it gets sent to you with some money already put on the card (roughly 1300 yen if I remember right?). It is incredibly useful if you are planning on staying within Tokyo, as you can use this on the trains and on the underground service as well. You literally tap in and tap out from station to station, and it will tell you how much is left on your card as you do both. It's a really easy way to keep an eye on how much you have left on your card as well! It's dead easy to top up, and you can find these machines in pretty much every station. The machines have a little button to translate it to English for you, making the whole process much easier. I used this for my stay in Tokyo, however it may well be worth thinking about getting one if you are travelling around and staying in a place that doesn't have a JR station. I stayed in Asakusa in Tokyo on my first trip, and this area doesn't have a JR station so my mum and I found ourselves having to buy a ticket to a certain zone before being able to use our pass, which can get a little confusing!
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| The suica card I used for my second Japan trip |
You can find all of these passes that I have mentioned above on https://www.japan-rail-pass.co.uk, and this is the website that I have bought both my rail pass and my suica card from. The website will flash a box up on your screen (after a little time has passed) to help you work out what you need. All you do is need to input your email address and it is pretty helpful if you have looked and are still unsure of what you need. I have used this myself, and I did find it helpful.
What's this about portable wifi?
You will not be able to use data in Japan (I am not 100% why, I was first told about this by a friend that lives in Japan and have seen it confirmed online), so it is best to buy a sim card that has data already on it or rent a pocket wifi.
I never used a sim card, but these often have a data limit, a set limit of days that you have to buy (e.g 15 or 30 days), and may not be compatible with the mobile phone that you have. If you use up all of your data, you may not be able to use your phone for the internet unless you buy some more. You will also need to activate the sim card before you are able to use it, and you will need an internet connection to do so for some sim cards. The data allowance was one of the reasons why I chose not to buy one to use. (I bought one so I could have a Japanese number for my pokémon cafe booking, but that's another blog). Do not let my personal choice put you off, do some research as this may be better suited for you.
I ordered a pocket wifi from https://www.japan-rail-pass.co.uk (I promise you that this is not a sponsor, this website is great!) and the process is straight forward. It's easy to carry around, you can charge it if you have a portable charger (if not you should buy one as it is handy!) and it doesn't drain the battery on it. It can have up to ten people connect to it and the data is unlimited, which is incredibly handy if there are three or more of you travelling together. Just note, you can only add one to your order so if you want to rent two or more you will need another member of your party to order one. All you just need to do to order it is to input a few details, including how many days you will need the wifi for, your flight details, your name and what time you are due to land in Japan.
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| Here's a screen shot of the first page of details you will need to fill in. |
On the next page you can chose if you want to have the pocket wifi delivered to the airport that you are landing in, or at your hotel. Both times I went to Japan I opted to have it sent to my hotel to make it easier for myself. If you do chose to have it sent to your hotel, be warned that Japanese addresses can look really confusing, but Google is a MASSIVE help when trying to work out how to fill it in. I personally loved that you can input the exact amount of days that you will need it for! It comes with a prepaid for envelope that you will need to keep to send it back in, and if you are flying home from Haneda or Narita you can send it back from there as there are post boxes that you can use, and they will have labels on them showing you what slot to post it through. I am not sure about the other airports within Japan as I have never been to them, but if you are worried about there not being a post box at the airport you are flying from find a postbox to post it in before you leave for the airport.
The pocket wifi from this website is something that I would really recommend. I have heard stories of other people ordering pocket wifi from different websites and there not being a huge amount of data available on it. The one from this website has been easy for me to order and I've never had any problems with the pocket wifi I have ordered.
Anything else?
Keep a plastic sleeve with all of your hotel information on, including phone numbers and email addresses. Have the information printed in both Japanese and English in case of emergencies. You will also need this information to fill out two cards that you will be given on the plane and they will need to be filled in before you go through passport control. This will save you having to google the address and number of your hotel when you are in the airport. If you are staying in several areas, just fill in the information of the first hotel you are staying in. Look into possible hotel transfers in case the thought of having to catch a train is overwhelming.
Have fun, be safe and enjoy yourself!
P.S. Keep your eyes open for a future blog about what to expect when you are in Japan!
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