My wife and I spent a week in Japan in October and I thought I’d share some throughts from this trip. We prefer to take it easy, walk a lot and soak in culture/everyday life rather than having full itineraries.
## General
– **Train pass**. We had bought the Japan train pass and it was very smooth to use it. Exchanging it at Narita airport took 20 min waiting in queue. We booked seats for our trains only when arriving at the stations in good time before departure. The ticket offices could sometimes have long queues but it was possible to reserve seats using the ticketing machines as well. If using ticketing machines you select English, press “Japan pass reservation” (or something alike) and from there it guides you. You will need to have your passport numbers ready. [This app](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=jp.go.jnto.jota&hl=en&gl=US) was pretty good for looking up itineraries.
As with all things train travel, [Seat61](https://www.seat61.com/Japan.htm) is a great source of information. Be sure to bring food with you to the train. The toilets were always clean. The trains only make short stops at the stations, so be ready to get off when you need to.
– **Getting around**. There was never a need for a taxi or car (except for Ibaraki). Public transportation or walking worked in all cities, and for long-distance travel train or buses were readily available. The JR train pass also covers some local transportation, for example some local trains in Tokyo and Osaka.
– **Masks**. Masks were mandatory everyone inside and usually worn outside as well. There were partitions between restaurant tables. Adherence to the mask regulation was very good among Japanese but unfortunately I saw plenty foreigners who didn’t bother adapting to the local rules.
– **Trash**. There are *no* trashcans readily available. Only some train platforms, trains and in some convenience stores will you find places to dispose of trash. So be prepared to carry it with you until you reach your accommodation. What is good though is the strict recycling sorting once you find trashcans.
## Ibaraki
– Our first night was with a Japanese friend who lived in rural Ibaraki, northeast of Tokyo. I can’t really comment on the area as we spent time at our friend’s house. Worth mentioning was the small city of **Sawara** that we visisted. This place is worth spending half a day in to visit old style houses and look in “traditional” shops.
## Kanazawa
– This city was bigger than I imagined but was not a big city per se. Our favourite experience here was visiting our hotel’s onsen. We stayed at **Onyado Nono Kanazawa**. It is a pretty big hotel with no shoes allowed on the premises. You receive a yukata/pyjama kind of thing that you can wear while at the hotel (at breakfast almost everyone wore those). The onsen area was big with free noodles and ice-cream afterwards. I recommend checking out a video about onsen etiquette before your first visit.
– We took a stroll in the **Kenroku-en** park and it was nice to see for a few hours. By coincidence we happened to stroll into the **Morning market** which I would recommend if you haven’t been to such markets before. Visiting the old town **Higashi Chaya** was fun to see and done in an hour.
– For dinner just taking random backstreet restaurants in **Katamachi** was fun. For lunch we mostly tried very local places outside the tourist areas and got really fun experiences. I would recommend a visit to **Kanazawa Shu Shu** which is a sake bar with light food. They have really great tasting menus and friendly atmosphere.
## Takayama
– We took the train to Takayama which is a quaint city in the mountains. There were plenty of tourists there and the city is easy to navigate. We stayed at the marvellous **Ryokan Asunaro** where we received a really warm welcome, fantastic room and especially, an amazing dinner. I highly recommend to stay there with the dinner included, it was 13 well-prepared small dishes that were fun to try. The second night was spent on **Hida Hotel Plaza** which was a blast from the past (in a negative way) and in need of renovation.
– We took the bus to the **Shinhotaka Ropeway** and went up to the top. We thought we’d be able to hike down to the base again but this wasn’t possible so instead we walked downwards for 2-3 hours, catching the bus back at one of the frequent bus stops. The bus leaves every hour with the ropeway as its final stop. We wanted to stay somewhere along the bus route but everything was full so instead went back to Takayama and booked a simple hotel on the bus. Also in Takayama vi visited **Hida no Sato, the Hida folk village** which showed plenty about how people had lived in the past.
РWe visisted a small caf̩ called **Sabou Usagi** which I highly recommend. The menu is short but the owner really sweet and it serves Japanese flavours.
## Osaka
– Having fallen for the onsen culture we booked **Dormy Inn Premium Kitahama** which was part of the same chain as our Kanazawa-hotel. While the onsen was nice, it wasn’t as charming as their sister property. We had an early departure from Itami airport the second night and so booked simple airport hotel **Hotel A.P** which is ok if you set your expectations low. One word of advice here: The hotel is walkable from the airport, but make sure you then choose the north route, not the south which will make you walk on a pretty busy road.
– Wanting to experience more of the “odd” pop culture we explored **Denden***, popping in to small shops. We also spent some hours at **Osaka Museum of History** which unfortunately had pertty sparse info in English, I think we’d enjoyed it more had we understood more of the exhibits.
– For getting around we bought a one-day metro pass which was easy to do in the machine.
## Tokyo
– We had a 12h layover in Haneda (morning-evening) so we took the monorail (available with the train pass) to Tokyo city (Hamamatsucho station). We stumbled upon **Hamarikyu Gardens** but having seen similar in Kawasaki this wasn’t more than your average stroll in a park. We walked onwards to **TeamLab** where we had pre-purchased tickets. This was a fun exhibit that I’d recommend a visit to. Some of the art seemed to have been created by city-dwellers with no connection to nature, but it was a really cool experience. After sun set we wandered around in **Ginza** a bit before returning to the airport.
## Summary
– Overall, my main recommendation would be **Takayama** since it offers plenty Japanese culture and seems to be a living city with good possibilities for excursions. However, it seems like with a rail pass and open itinerary you can’t really go wrong.