Japan has been on my must visit list for about eight years, however for one reason or another, I never quite got around to it until now. It was finally decided whilst on last years holiday that 2008 would be the year for Japan and I visited for two weeks in March.

Getting there and around

I chose to fly to and from Tokyo (Narita airport), however it is also possible to fly to Osaka (Kansai) which is about 350 miles away and convenient for Kyoto, the old capital and in my view a must see destination in any Japan trip. It is also fairly common to fly into one airport and out of another. Narita Airport is about 80km from the centre of Tokyo and taxis are very expensive, it would easily cost £150 in a taxi so the best advice is to take the train or an airport bus into the city. I am not sure how much this cost as uncharacteristically we had not researched properly and ended up jumping into one of only three taxis outside the airport. We jumped out and diverted to a train station somewhere between Narita and Tokyo once we saw the fare increasing at an alarming rate. The train fare from wherever we were was £5 each. On the way back we took an airport bus and this cost £15 each and took just under two hours.

We explored Tokyo using the subway and local train system. It was extremely easy to buy tickets and navigate the system. The only slightly confusing part was leaving the station, much bigger than any station on the London underground, with many exits and it is not always easy to work out which one you need. We avoided using the subway during rush hour as we have heard it can be extremely crowded, it was absolutely fine at the times of day we did use it. We also attempted to use the subway in Kyoto, however after staring at the map for quite some time we had to give up and get a taxi. It was very confusing and the stations did not appear to even have the same names as the stations in our guide book map of the system, hence we could not work out where we needed to head.

I had established some years ago that when I went to Japan, the best time would be Spring or Autumn. The summer can get hot, humid and wet and the winter is a bit too cold for my liking on holiday. We had great weather in March, it was warmer that we expected in fact, averaging about 15c and we had rainfall on two out of fourteen days. Those days were a total wash out though, it can rain for a long time and seemed heavier than typical rain in UK. (Note I have not lived in the UK for two years and believe there has been some particularly wet weather during my absence, which I do not want to make light of)!

I was pleasantly surprised to find that the Japanese electrical sockets are the same as the ones in Bermuda (and the US), so I did not need an adaptor, just as well as I had not brought one. Travelling from the UK and you should bring an adaptor with two straight, parallel prongs. No mobile phone from outside Japan is going to work in Japan, so that is one charger you might as well leave at home.

I could not possibly comment on the different types and costs of accommodation in Japan and will therefore confine my comments to my own experiences. In Tokyo, we chose to stay in high end hotels Mandarin Oriental at the beginning and the Park Hyatt at the end. These are both high rise and provided fabulous views of the city. In other places we opted for ryokans, the traditional Japanese inn. Most ryokans provide a traditional dinner, comprising many courses and served by ladies in traditional dress whilst you are seated on the floor in your room. After dinner, the low table is put away and your futon bed is made up. We had a private bathroom all but one night whilst in the ryokans, the baths are not like ours, they are made of wood, square and very deep. The communal bathroom is a bigger version. I would definitely recommend staying in a ryokan at least a couple of nights during any trip to Japan but you probably would not want to do it throughout.

Once we did get to eat, the standard was very high in most places. Accordingly my tip for dining, is that if you find somewhere that is not busy and has a picture menu then you might as well give it a try rather than shop around for somewhere else. We passed up some places only to regret it an hour or two later when we couldn't find anywhere else. I was surprised that we did not have sushi very often, in fact the only place we did was in the ryokans. We did see a few sushi bars, however found these were significantly outnumbered by the outlets serving noodles, rice dishes, gyoza (steamed dumplings) or panko (breaded) chicken or pork.

Pictures of General: Japan

In Tokyo

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We were a little disappointed with "nightlife", there did not seem to be much on offer for 30-something couples. I believe that Tokyo has an exciting nightclub scene, but that does not interest me anymore (not for these last ten years) and the rest seemed to be rather dodgy looking places, with dodgy sounding names that I am not sure a man should take his wife too. In Tokyo, Kyoto and Hiroshima we found ourselves wandering the town just looking for a "normal" pub or bar in which to have a quiet drink. On most nights we failed to find a single venue suitable despite wandering around the busiest part of town for over an hour. In Kyoto we came across a wine bar, however the cheapest bottle of wine was £250, so we left. In Hiroshima none of the three pubs in our guidebook actually existed and finally in Tokyo on our last night we found an Irish bar that was worth staying in for more than one drink. I did have to drink Guinness though, wine in Japan is universally awful. They are not a nation of wine drinkers.

We started and ended in Tokyo and overall had five full days which was neither too long nor too short. I had expected Tokyo to be hectic, crowded and perhaps over-whelming. This was not the case though, it is a large city but easy to navigate and I thought even the really busy shopping areas were far less crowded than London or New York say. I also think the inherent politeness and kindness of Japanese eliminated the possibility of feeling overwhelmed. We chose a couple of places to go each day; Meiji Jingu gardens and shrine was a good start and from here we walked to Shinjuku which is a busy shopping and eating area, lots of bright lights and photo opportunities.

Overall, Tokyo was a very enjoyable city to just wander around and I never tired of the night skyline from the high floor of our hotel.

Kyoto to me is old Japan. The more traditional nature of the place is self evident from the style of architecture, number of temples and shrines and we even saw several geisha girls going about their daily business. They have painted white faces, elaborate hairstyles and attract a lot of attention even from other Japanese.

Takayama

There are some very pretty streets to explore here but I found Takayama to be bigger and more developed than I had expected or hoped for. I was thinking it would be a quaint village, the Japanese equivalent of the Cotswolds perhaps but instead I found a fairly large, concrete town that has sadly been a victim of its own success in attracting tourists. Like me, yes I know. I would advise giving Takayama a miss and finding somewhere else in the mountains to visit.

Conclusion