Travelling in Japan (on a budget)

Japan is a travel destination, that I pretty much visit yearly. Yes it really is the wonderful magical land of joy and splendour everyone has told you about.

There is a common myth that Japan is an very expensive destination, and well compared to the rest of Asia it kinda is, but compared to other major metropolitan cities like NY, London or Paris its not that bad. In fact – if you know what you are doing – you can do Japan on a serious budget without compromising comfort.

Budget Travel has done a great article summarising all the places that you’d want to visit (Degourget approve’s of the choices) on a moderate budget. This definately isnt the cheapest travel plan for Japan, but its a pretty well rounded one.

Quirky Japan (warning: eyesore of a webpage) has a fairly detailed guide on how to really do it on the cheap. This one is full of useful tidbits of info from the cash strapped Japanohiles. I’m not proud to say it – but I’ve implemented some of these techniques and they work.

Some of the best tips include:

• How to identify Tabehoudai (All-You-Can-Eat) places
• Using Sento’s (Public Baths) or Onsens (Spring Baths) can be cheap or free in some cases
• Taking overnight trains instead of a hotel/hostel (especially good if you use the JR Pass)
• The Seishun Juhachi Kippu train ticket which lets you travel anywhere in japan for about USD$20

via Japundit

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