What to do in Japan for 2 weeks?

Since this is the Unofficial **Official Japan Thread**, may as well ask in here.

I'm trying to find a high end sushi place. However, there's just so much choice. A few seem to be only bookable if you have the right hotel concierge (I doubt my £65 a night place has a concierge, let alone one who can get me into the best places!), so I'd rather phone direct or book online.

I'm going to Osaka and Tokyo (and Kyoto, but got that planned already) and it seems to be to go to the high end place in Tokyo but happy to be convinced otherwise. Basically, has anyone got any suggestions? I'd like to keep it around £200 per person, but it doesn't need to cost that much.

I can get a table at Kanda, which is £225 and pretty mixed reviews albeit it having 3 stars.
 
£200/pp is not going to be indicative of "street food" under any circumstances and frankly when you get to that sort of price you have to question how much of it is genital waving as you will be well into the realm of diminishing returns (increase in quality is not proportional to the increase in price).

Personally I prefer the bowls of sashimi on a bed of rice over individual sushi anyway and in the right places you can get really good ones of these for reasonable prices.

Anyway .... got back from my sixth trip at the end of last week ... I'll add the following notes to the thread ...

- I used data sims for Japan from Mobal which worked very well. They use the Softbank network which our phones supported the frequencies for so it worked well for fast 4G access. I got a 10GB card and my Dad a 3GB one. One nice thing is that they ship internationally so you can get the SIM and fit it into your phone and then it auto-activates when it connects to the Softbank network.

- As a relatively cheap, conveniently placed, hotel in Osaka the Red Roof Plus in Namba is pretty good.

- Depending on weather and schedule it is possible to see Kamen Joshi West, and associated groups, do little performances on Dotonbori several times on a Monday evening for free.

- Japanese media is expensive and its the luck of the draw whether you can pick stuff up second hand in Book Off etc .... but, in Tokyo at least, Amazon Prime works really well for delivery to the hotel, normal gives around 26% off and only costs 400yen for a month (if you have already used the months free trial previously.

- Trying to pay for concert tickets for Family Mart can be an exercise in frustration and involve juggling multiple information sources to get their system to spit out the appropriate thing to take to the till.

- A lot of people say just take XXXX card and then take out any money you need .... but make sure you have a backup plan. Personally a lot of the places I like to go do not take cards so I make sure I have a reasonable amount of cash on me but use my normal debit card if I decide I want a bit more than I take. So I tend to check out whether the card is working before I make some expensive purchases so I don't use up all my cash without being able to replace it. For some reason this time my card would not work at all in Japanese Post ATMs (which it had worked in fine in on previous trips ... tried multiple ones in multiple Post Offices) ... they would not even read it spitting it out and saying it wasn't usable for the transaction before even asking for a pin. Fortunately it did still work, without issues, in the 7-eleven international ATMs.
 
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Thought I'd bump this thread as I arrived back yesterday and thought I'd put a few notes about finances.

I thought Japan would be incredibly expensive, especially as we (my girlfriend and I) were only going to Tokyo, Kyoto, Osaka and back to Osaka. For a bit of context, we didn't shop (I bought a keyring, and a £30 caligraphy thing) and she bought some cheap sourvineers. We like to drink, and eat. We mainly ate at busy places we walked past, and drank predominately at standing bars and with dinner. We went to the major temples, and Disney but mainly walked around and went into the independent galleries, and just soaked up the atmosphere.

In response to the above post, we mainly withdrew money at the 7-Eleven shops as they don't have fees, used a Post Office once and another convenience chain once or twice. These latter two places both had fees and I was using a Halifax Clarity Mastercard.

Our total spend for 13 nights, for two was £5455.16 or £2727.58. It's broken down as below, remember that these costs are for two:

Hotel spend - £1,381.23 (This includes a £372.86 night at a Ryokan in Kyoto which included dinner & breakfast). Other hotels were probably best classed as business hotels rather than luxury. We use the hotel as a base and tend to be out most of the day so not that interested in the facilities. As long as it's a good location, and clean we're happy. We did have 3 nights at an Airbnb in Tokyo which was around £100 a night. I can put hotel names, and more details about pricing if anyone wants.
Flights - £823.72 (Edinburgh - Amsterdam - Narita) and then (Handea - Paris - Amsterdam - Glasgow)
Rail pass - £408.00 (7 day rail pass, including delivery).
Wifi - £56.95 (This is a pocket wifi device, gave us unlimited internet for the whole period. Picked up at Narita airport and popped it in a post box at Handea on the way out. Great value).
ATM spend - £2,278.99 (We mostly spent using cash, so this covered dinners, drinks, snacks, entrance fees for attractions, etc.)
Miscellaneous -£506.26 (This includes Mario Kart, a couple of cocktail bars where I paid on card rather than cash, Disney Tokyo and a few bottles of booze).
Total Spend
£5,455.16
Per person
£2727.58

Overall, I think this is great value and we were surprised with how affordable it was. You can easily spend hundreds on a night out, but you can also spend £30 and have a great night out. Indeed, each time we went out to a place that only had Japanese people in it we were bought drinks, given food and had a better time compared to the places suggested in Lonely Planet/online blogs which are full of tourists and inflated prices.
We got ripped off once, where we paid £20 for two bottles of Ashai but that was in a Korean bar...

Happy to answer any questions and I'll try and get some pictures up ASAP.
 
Ahleckz said:
Thought I'd bump this thread as I arrived back yesterday and thought I'd put a few notes about finances.

I thought Japan would be incredibly expensive, especially as we (my girlfriend and I) were only going to Tokyo, Kyoto, Osaka and back to Osaka. For a bit of context, we didn't shop (I bought a keyring, and a £30 caligraphy thing) and she bought some cheap sourvineers. We like to drink, and eat. We mainly ate at busy places we walked past, and drank predominately at standing bars and with dinner. We went to the major temples, and Disney but mainly walked around and went into the independent galleries, and just soaked up the atmosphere.

In response to the above post, we mainly withdrew money at the 7-Eleven shops as they don't have fees, used a Post Office once and another convenience chain once or twice. These latter two places both had fees and I was using a Halifax Clarity Mastercard.

Our total spend for 13 nights, for two was £5455.16 or £2727.58. It's broken down as below, remember that these costs are for two:

Hotel spend - £1,381.23 (This includes a £372.86 night at a Ryokan in Kyoto which included dinner & breakfast). Other hotels were probably best classed as business hotels rather than luxury. We use the hotel as a base and tend to be out most of the day so not that interested in the facilities. As long as it's a good location, and clean we're happy. We did have 3 nights at an Airbnb in Tokyo which was around £100 a night. I can put hotel names, and more details about pricing if anyone wants.
Flights - £823.72 (Edinburgh - Amsterdam - Narita) and then (Handea - Paris - Amsterdam - Glasgow)
Rail pass - £408.00 (7 day rail pass, including delivery).
Wifi - £56.95 (This is a pocket wifi device, gave us unlimited internet for the whole period. Picked up at Narita airport and popped it in a post box at Handea on the way out. Great value).
ATM spend - £2,278.99 (We mostly spent using cash, so this covered dinners, drinks, snacks, entrance fees for attractions, etc.)
Miscellaneous -£506.26 (This includes Mario Kart, a couple of cocktail bars where I paid on card rather than cash, Disney Tokyo and a few bottles of booze).
Total Spend
£5,455.16
Per person
£2727.58

Overall, I think this is great value and we were surprised with how affordable it was. You can easily spend hundreds on a night out, but you can also spend £30 and have a great night out. Indeed, each time we went out to a place that only had Japanese people in it we were bought drinks, given food and had a better time compared to the places suggested in Lonely Planet/online blogs which are full of tourists and inflated prices.
We got ripped off once, where we paid £20 for two bottles of Ashai but that was in a Korean bar...

Happy to answer any questions and I'll try and get some pictures up ASAP.
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£2700 is cheap for 2 weeks. Any chance of pics?

I am itching to go back again, this time only for 1 week I think, will do some day trips out of Tokyo to nearby area, and will plan another in 2020 during April if i can in the Kyoto and more southern regions Japan. Anyway, what hotels did you stay at in Tokyo?

I am thinking of doing this. The hotel I stayed at last time some reason i can't book yet, its too early. This will have another 12% cash back so should be around £1600. Flight is around £800 direct so it works out like £120 or so a night which isn't a bad deal.

YRs3NSj.png
 
Raymond Lin said:
£2700 is cheap for 2 weeks. Any chance of pics?

I am itching to go back again, this time only for 1 week I think, will do some day trips out of Tokyo to nearby area, and will plan another in 2020 during April if i can in the Kyoto and more southern regions Japan. Anyway, what hotels did you stay at in Tokyo?

I am thinking of doing this. The hotel I stayed at last time some reason i can't book yet, its too early. This will have another 12% cash back so should be around £1600. Flight is around £800 direct so it works out like £120 or so a night which isn't a bad deal.

YRs3NSj.png
Click to expand...


Thinking of doing the same myself, small trip this year before another longer one the year after following my more usual pattern.

Hyatt Regency Tokyo is quite a nice hotel, that's where we stayed in Tokyo last time. Convenient that you can get to it without going outside if its raining by using the tunnels to get to underground stations. Staff were helpful and the only downside of the rooms was a lack of BD player like the Hilton.
 
memyselfandi said:
Thinking of doing the same myself, small trip this year before another longer one the year after following my more usual pattern.

Hyatt Regency Tokyo is quite a nice hotel, that's where we stayed in Tokyo last time. Convenient that you can get to it without going outside if its raining by using the tunnels to get to underground stations. Staff were helpful and the only downside of the rooms was a lack of BD player like the Hilton.
Click to expand...

Not bothered about the TV, I think i only turned it on once in Japan in 2 weeks.

p.s. what do you mean by usual pattern?
 
Usual pattern ... I normally go every other year, so as 2018 was a main trip 2020 would normally be the next one.

TV is good for checking that second hand media is working and seeing just how bad most Japanese TV shows are :)
 
memyselfandi said:
Usual pattern ... I normally go every other year, so as 2018 was a main trip 2020 would normally be the next one.

TV is good for checking that second hand media is working and seeing just how bad most Japanese TV shows are :)
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Ah, I used to take my old MBP which was so old it has a DVD-Rom.

I did see some weird gameshow, it was weird lol
 
I think the best I saw was some quiz between two teams, one from Tokyo University and the other some comedians ... A lot of it was totally dire though. It wasn't as if I would spends hours watching it ... Just a little bit after getting back to the hotel while winding down before bed.
 
What do people think about going in winter time (over UK Christmas-New Year)?
2019 Christmas period my office is shut and if I take two extra days I get two weeks and I'm considering Japan.

Don't know if it will be a good time of the year to visit though. I really wanted my next time to be in Spring.
 
bsoltan said:
What do people think about going in winter time (over UK Christmas-New Year)?
2019 Christmas period my office is shut and if I take two extra days I get two weeks and I'm considering Japan.

Don't know if it will be a good time of the year to visit though. I really wanted my next time to be in Spring.
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Japan in Christmas is a far more commercial event than it is here, it's actually more like Valentine's day. Their main religion is Shintoism and Budhhism. Its more about spending time with your partner than with your family. The minute the clock strikes midnight the workers takes down all the decorations. New year's is more about family, as opposed to a party, it's very different than us.

It is cheap though and low season so it's basically like normal but colder with pretty Christmas lights. It would be a good time to avoid the crowds IMO.
 
memyselfandi said:
I think the best I saw was some quiz between two teams, one from Tokyo University and the other some comedians ... A lot of it was totally dire though. It wasn't as if I would spends hours watching it ... Just a little bit after getting back to the hotel while winding down before bed.
Click to expand...

I saw one where 2 teams of girls grabbing each other's bum blindfolded trying to guess the person.
 
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