Japan Travel Tips & Hidden Gems
Sitting around the sunken irori hearth on the skin of a bear while listening to Oriyama-san talk about the culture of northern Akita’s Matagi hunters, I thought to myself, “This is exactly the side of Japan that I signed up…
You know… Even all these years later, Fukushima continues to get a bad rap due to the earthquake and subsequent tsunami that happened in 2011. Honestly, it breaks my heart whenever someone inevitably shows up in the comment section of…
I was making my way back from a grueling adventure along the Kumano Kodo. In this rural part of the country, buses are few and far between, and the one that I was waiting for was my last hope of…
For the longest time, I thought I was cursed when it came to Okayama and actively avoided going there. You see, in the late 2010s, every single time I braved an outing to Okayama, it seemed that the prefecture wanted…
The train violently lurched forward, only to immediately come to a sudden stop. At the front of the car, the seven JR East staff trying to get home on this doomed departure bound for Akita Prefecture all sucked air through…
If you haven’t seen the headlines already, the government just announced that 2025 saw an estimated record of 42.7 million tourists. This new all-time high brought in a whopping 9.5 trillion yen in revenue, which is a significant boon to…
Welcome back to yet another article on Kyushu’s Kagoshima Prefecture. I promise that this will be the last one for a little while. It’s just that I have so much to share from my adventures there in late 2025. This…
These days, travelers are increasingly venturing off Japan’s so-called “Golden Route,” which stretches from Tokyo down to Kyoto and Osaka, ultimately ending in Hiroshima. Now on their third, fourth, or tenth visit to Japan, these travelers are clamoring for something…
Just recently, I landed back in Japan after a few weeks reconnecting with the last remnants of family that I still have in the States. After arriving and smoothly making my way through customs without an overly aggressive agent grilling…
Welcome back to yet another installment of Backyard Tourism. Like every other article in the series, we’ll be taking a look at a true hidden gem this time. As always, the goal is to showcase how just about anywhere in…
Maybe this is an American thing, but I am always shocked to see just how poorly Japan’s geography is understood. When asked to place Kyoto or even Tokyo on a map, the majority of people struggle. Now, I know readers…
Recently, I took a trip to northern Japan to shoot promotional content for the JR East Pass (Tohoku Area). The last time I did this, I tried to jump from region to region as I climbed my way north to…
FAM Tour (n.)Short for “familiarization tour.” A complimentary and often financially incentivized trip organized by a destination, DMO, or tourism bureau to acquaint professionals such as travel agents, influencers, bloggers, and journalists with what the region has to offer. As…
Oftentimes, I say on social media that I need many lifetimes just for Japan. In fact, I doubt that even 10,000 years would be enough to see it all. And even then, by the time a hundred centuries pass, there…
Last week, when writing about Takasaki City in Gunma Prefecture, I referenced Ikaho Onsen a number of times. After hitting publish, though, I realized that I never actually wrote an article on this traditional onsen town. While I have prior…