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Tag: Japan

  • Japan on a Budget: Kagoshima and Sakurajima

    If getting from Nagasaki to Kumamoto proved a bit tricky, getting from Kumamoto to Kagoshima is a breeze: jump on the Kyushu Shinkansen and head south – it terminates at Kagoshimachuo station, right in the city (Kagoshima Eki is to the northwest). I arrived in town early in the morning to find shopkeepers still busy…

  • Japan on a Budget: Kumamoto

    If you’re traveling around Kyushu, you’re likely to pass through Kumamoto more than once. Which is fine, as it’s a really pleasant city in which to while away a few hours or days. Transport and Trains Kumamoto is on the Kyushu Shinkansen line, roughly half-way down the island and so between Hakata in the north…

  • Japan on a Budget: Nagasaki and Shimabara

    Everybody knows of Nagasaki for one reason. And, like Hiroshima, it’s the home to both an excellent museum documenting the nuclear attack and some moving memorials to the victims. But, away to the South, there’s much more to see besides – if you’re in Kyushu, it’s a city I wouldn’t want to miss. Transport and…

  • Japan on a Budget: Fukuoka

    A few years back I traveled around the Kansai area, and last year I headed North from Tokyo to visit the Tohoku region. This year, something a bit different – sidestepping Tokyo altogether, I decided to visit the south-western island of Kyushu. In the end I managed to almost entirely circle the island, taking in…

  • Japan on a Budget: Fukushima-ken

    Aizuwakamatsu, Fukushima-ken Three years ago, most people probably hadn’t heard of Fukushima. Today everybody has heard of it, but very few people are visiting. This is a great shame, for many reasons. The name itself is something of a problem. Fukushima is the prefecture, a city within it, and also the namesake of the nuclear…

  • Japan on a Budget: Tazawako and Nyuto Onsen

    Tazawa is a beautiful, almost circular, lake in Akita-ken. Getting near the lake is easy: use the Akita mini-shinkansen, which if you’re coming from the south runs together with the main Tohoku line and forks off at Morioka (from the north, change there). Getting to the lake itself is harder. Having failed to find a…

  • Japan on a Budget: Tohoku by Train

    Matsushima, near Sendai, Miyagi-ken I came back from last year’s trip around southern Honshu determined to work on my kanji and head back the next year. One year, one hundred and twenty kanji and three more terms of general  study later, I was on a plane to Narita again. And this time, with something approaching…

  • Japan on a budget, 2: Tokyo

    (This is part of a guide to travelling Honshu on a moderate budget and in limited time. Click here for the whole series). Arriving International flights arrive at Narita, outside Tokyo. It’s worth claiming your Japan Rail Pass in the large JR office here (follow signs to the trains, and it’s before the ticket gates)…

  • Japan on a budget, 3: Kyoto

    (This is part of a guide to travelling Honshu on a moderate budget and in limited time. Click here for the whole series). I arrived in Kyoto on my second day, via Shinkansen from Tokyo. You arrive at the huge JR Kyoto station, from which you can link to the local JR lines, the private…