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The original was posted on /r/japantravel by /u/lostmemento on 2024-10-15 17:41:07+00:00.

This was out first time going to Japan after wanting to go for our honey moon but then COVID hit. There were some things I’d do again and some things I definitely would avoid. I go into detail but I ramble and my memory is hazy so feel free to ask questions about the specific places and I’ll see if I can remember better!

*Prices in USD

Biggest recommendations:

• Buy the comfiest shoes OR schedule breaks

At the end of everyday we had walked about 20k+ steps. Our peak steps were probably 30k but there wasn’t a day we didn’t walk at least 20k steps. This was including taking taxis and public transportation different places. We are in our 30s and were feeling it. Plus you have to think of it cumulatively that the next and next day will feel “worse” cause you’re not having much time to rest. We still slept from 9/10pm - 6am and we were out like a light.

• Time investment

Make sure you are scheduling time for things such as walking breaks and shopping! We didn’t think of putting time to shop because we wanted to see things. We did end up shopping sporadically but we did do the thing of shopping a bit before our flight time to get souvenirs for friends and co-workers last minute. Also, there were those times when we were window shopping on our walks near our accommodations and said to ourselves: “We’ll get it later.” then never did. So, just keep some of these small things in mind.

E-sim vs Pocket WIFI

Me and my partner are from the US so he had AT&T and I had T-mobile. He had better coverage than me and didn’t need anything extra. Sometimes his service was spotty but overall at 5G. For T-mobile I had LTE most places but it would load a snails pace compared to my husband. I got Airalo (Esim) to supplement but it didn’t do very much, so I would recommend pocket wifi if you can if you don’t have a good AT&T plan. Not sure about other American carriers.

Pocket Wifi a huge recommendation!

Transportation

I say this but take it with a grain of salt because I am from New York and are use to large sprawling train maps: I thought navigating the subway system was easy. Google maps is really helpful in letting you know which train car is least busy or would provide you a better exit towards the exit you need to get out of the train station. I really appreciate Japan’s number system for stations as it reminds you that “oh 2 stops from now is 19 that’s my stop.”

What I did notice is that in Kyoto and Osaka vs Tokyo - that the numbers of the stations weren’t listed in google maps as much so you need to pay attention. My easiest advice surrounding this is just look up the stations that are on the gates, if the station is farther on the google maps or lists one of the closer ones then it is probably the direction you’re going. If it isn’t listed at all, then you’re going the wrong direction.

For example: the stops will say like Namba, etc. etc. if Namba is a stop after yours but on the train itself it says something else it’s still your train if you are on the right side. We would get confused as some trains will list another stop. This just might mean express or something, so keep that in mind. But, it was easier than saying on we have to get on this one particular train that google said. Google can be wrong.

Go Taxi app is definitely your friend. The prices can be kind of costly to some who aren’t used to it but it’s about $1 per min and more if it’s rush hour time. So for example instead of taking 1hr+ train to a shrine we decided to take a 40min taxi which was about $56.

Shinkansen. Always opt for this. This was a small battle I had with my husband but we went from Osaka to Himeji Castle and did the limited express. We were doing this during morning business hours so it was kind of busy. If you aren’t aware what a limited express is, it is basically a normal subway car that goes to fewer stops. It was kind of crowded and you just didn’t have nicer seats like on a Shinkansen, so if you’re able opt for those instead of the local express trains. Also, definitely recommend getting tickets ahead of time even ahead of your days while in Japan. Otherwise, you’ll be waiting in semi long lines depending on the day and hour to get our day of tickets either at a ticket machine (if you can operate it) or at the ticket counter.

Definitely use Yakamoto or other luggage shipping options when possible. It is kind of false to say there are no escalators/elevators for this at train stations. There ARE just at very particular exits that you will have to find via the signs. There are no notable signs on the outside of the stations, just inside.

Accommodations

Tokyo - Tokyu Stay Ginza (5 nights, $1500)

I really liked this hotel, we opted for a bigger room which gave enough space and had a bath and heated toilet. It can include breakfast which provides both western and eastern choices. Sometimes there are restaurants that only let you book once you check into a hotel. My only bleh about this hotel was that they didn’t really assist in help booking restaurants, I think in case something went wrong? I’m not sure but it was kind of frustrating as it was a nice hotel. My other bleh was that there were stains on the carpet but I still felt the room was clean.

Hakone - Matsuzakaya Honten (1 night, $780)

We stayed at this place for the Ryoken and onsen experience. We opted for a room where there is a private onsen, but they had private onsens you could book or public ones as well. We also chose to have the traditional dinner and breakfast. If you are not one for seafood (like my husband) they were great at making swaps for that. The room was cool to experience and the private onsen was great. Their hospitality was very great and would go back in a heartbeat.

Hakone is up in the mountains. It is a nice place to try and view Mt. Fuji and the Hakone gate which is an instagram spot. I say try, because it was cloudy and foggy the 2 days we were there an unable to see the mountain but the lake there is beautiful. They provide boats to go out on the lake if you want but because it rained they shut it down early even though the rain wasn’t too bad.

I would just keep in mind that the buses in Hakone run at a snails pace and are few and far between. It is a nice quaint area for viewing the mountain or having a onsen experience but the buses are ill equipped to handle the amount of tourists.

Kyoto - Nol Kyoto Sanjo (4 nights, $900)

This was probably my favorite hotel. It had great service was on the medium to small side. They have a really cool hotel lobby (past the hotel desk). It had a nice layout and a wonderful Hiba wood tub that smelled really good.

I felt like Kyoto was the most ill equipped with tourism infrastructure. Since there are a lot of tourists or what it felt like when I went, Kyoto just didn’t have the public transport or organization that I felt like the other cities sort of had to support the abundance of tourist.

Osaka - Hotel Cordia Hommachi (4 nights, $350)

This was probably my least favorite hotel. It was cramped and didn’t have a bathtub to soak your worn feet. There were a lot of Western customers, which is fine but it didn’t feel like a Japanese hotel, if that makes sense.

Food & Restaurants

This part is pretty short cause I don’t recall all the restaurants we went to but the ones that stood out were:

Gyukatsu Ichi Ni San (Tokyo) - we didn’t plan on eating here but we were in the area. It opens at 11am I believe and we waited at 10. We were maybe the 20th in line but because it only seats 12ish, we waited 2 hours before eating. The meal was great but the waiting kind of took away from the experience. I chose the small but the time we got to eat and seeing the portion my husband and I agreed we could have gone a size up each. (Him large and me medium.)

Serves: beef katsu

Ryan (Tokyo) - this restaurant specializes in soba noodles. They have a set menu or you can order a la carte. We made a reservation because my husband doesn’t do seafood but I love soba. It was probably one of our best meals we had in Japan. We ordered cold soba and some wagyu which was delicious. Some seating is by the prep stations and since it caters to Japanese clients we unfortunately didn’t get to talk much with our chef. But a neat thing was they save the soba water and you can drink it after your meal. It was actually pretty good and I will remember the experience fondly.

Serves: Soba noodles

Hyakuten Manten (Kyoto) - I have a fond memory of this place because it was after a long day and I didn’t think I’d be up for curry again. But, we had katsu and curry. My husband had curry ramen. They curry flavor was amazing and the owners who work there are a sweet elderly couple. The husband asked where we came from and the wife didn’t know much english but I used a translator to let her know it was very delicious and to keep going and she was so sweet. Definitely recommend.

Serves: curry ramen or with rice

Kichi Kichi Omurice - was hard to get reservations even though I got on on time. We had the form filled in but when we went to select a time the drop down glitched and didn’t give us a time. We did the time first then put our name the 2nd attempt but it was just so busy. However, we went to another omurice place and honestly it wasn’t for me. It’s an omelet with rice in it…

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