Hi everyone~!Welcome to my blog. Today I would like to share my way of planning my Japan with you. And you can download my travel planner for FREE. (link is at the bottom of the post)
I have loved Japan since I was a kid. My Dad loves Manga and Japanese Tv drama and my Mum loves Japanese food, so their passion passed to me and my sister.
(My Sakura trip in 2016)
I guess I am lucky that Hong Kong is quite close to Japan so we had the opportunity to visit Japan a several times.
And I love planning trips, no matter if it's a family trip or business trip, I like to spend time on research and planning. Although my last full time job was as a fashion designer, it was a small company where I had to work like a merchandiser so I did a lot of business trips with customer, needed to plan a perfect working schedule for tons of meetings.
I strongly believe that good research and planning can let you have a smooth trip and I enjoy my trip so far. It is not about following the plan 100% without mistakes ( and we are not having a training boot camp) . It's a helpful guideline for us to have a smooth trip. And now I am sharing how I plan my trip to Japan to you.
1 Where to go? Kansai? Kandon? Hokkaido? EastNorth? Shikoku?
2 Research, Research, Research (Season, hotel and transportation)
3 Fill the Puzzle and build the schedule
4 Have a Conservative Budget
1) Where to go? Kansai? Kandon? Hokkaido? NorthEast? Shikoku?
Although everyone said Japan is small, it has different culture among cities. It is difficult to travel all around Japan in just two weeks. So if you’re visiting with limited time (less than a month), I believe that it will be nice for you to choose no more than 3 cities (close to each other) to explore.
I am a huge Kansai/Kinki fan (the western area including Osaka, Kyoto, Nara, etc), so I always stay in Osaka. Usually it was a short trip (7-10 days) so I would only stay in Osaka instead of moving around. It will be a waste of time to move from one city to another. So first thing you need to do is pick the city you wanna visit, do some research on it and the area around it and create your dream travel to do list.
2) Research, Research, Research (Season, hotel and transportation)
There are few peak travel seasons in Japan, for example Sakura Season from March to April, Summer Firework Season from July to August, Fall Leaves Season from October to November, etc. If you have a budget, it’s definitely worth visiting it in those special times. However, if you don’t want to spend too much, you may need to avoid that.
For me, I try my best to avoid the Japanese Public Holiday, especially the LONG WEEKEND! Japanese are keen on local travel during the long weekend and there will be people everywhere from the city to the countryside. And hotel fees may be double or even triple in those periods so…I try my best to avoid it.
After deciding how many days to spend, I will decide where to stay. If I don’t need to travel among counties or districts, I will usually stay in one to two cities. Public Transportation is very well developed in Japan, we can easily travel among cities by train. For example it takes around 30-45 mins from Osaka to Kyoto.
I am not a driving person so I usually choose a hotel near the metro station. I will choose a station with an elevator since my parents are getting old and they are not walking well. And it’s easier to move the luggage. For more details, I will write another blog post of how I do my research on transportation, hotel and sightseeing.
3) Fill the Puzzle and build the schedule
After having all the information, I will start filling the schedule. It’s just like filling a puzzle. There are only a few days I really care more, which is landing & leaving and the big moving day ( hotel changing day). After deciding all the transportation day, I can start playing around with sightseeing spots, activities on our dream travel list and start budgeting.
If I am traveling with family, I usually invite them to join the planning. Good communication is the key to having a happy trip. And of course, it is ok to switch days according to actual situations such as weather, body condition, etc. I don’t force myself to follow the schedule straightly, it is not a business trip. It is a vacation, we should all have fun. The schedule is just a guideline and it helps to build our budget plan.
4) Have a Conservative Budget
After watching a few Youtube channels about personal finance, I am surprised that there are lots of people having over budget problems when taking a trip. Although I am not a financial nerd and keep track of every dollar I spent on the trip, I do have a clear idea of the approximate amount.
For transportation fees, it’s easy to know the exact amount. The Japanese transportation system is very nice. You can easily find the exact price of train or bus tickets online.
For dining, for sure it depends on where are you visiting. For a regular restaurant, it cost about 1500-2500 yen per person (US$10-$17). If you want to have some fancy meal, you can always check out their menu and have a brief guess. I usually plan 1-2 fancy meal for family trip, it was about US$30-50 per person. If we are visiting a theme park or food market, I will put more budget on it. Trust me, Japanese are so good at making snacks and street food and you don’t want to miss it, especially for foodies.
For hotels, I usually use the pre-pay policy in Agoda. Then I will print out the reservation and save a soft copy as well. Yes, I admit that I am a very conservative traveler but it helps me have a smooth trip. Since I can pre-pay the hotel fee, I don’t have to worry much.
And there is Accomodation Tax and it’s different among cities. However, the tax is not high so you don’t need to worry. It’s usually 100-200 yen per night.
After figuring out all the BIG MONEY subjects, then I will have a brief research on the activities we want to do. Finally, I will multiply the amount by 1.5-2 and make sure that I already save enough for the trip.
Here is a planner I use to plan my Japan trip. And for sure I will write more about the details in the coming blog. This is just a brief introduction of how I plan my trip to Japan.
If you would like to know more, you are welcome to leave a comment.
Download the free travel planner template: Click Here
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