The JAPLANNING begins!

Well hello there!

Where to start, where to start…well, as I mentioned in my last post, I’m off to Japan in November with my friend Alex and we’ve been furiously JAPLANNING (oh yes!) for this incredible trip.

This is Alex:

I’ve clearly found whatever he’s said, hilarious!

We’re going for two full weeks and are determined to cover as much ground as possible! In order to do that, we’re opting for JR rail passes which allow unlimited travel on their trains for a certain amount of time, we’ve gone for two week passes which cost £247 each. If you’re planning to travel all over the country (like us!) it’s cheaper to plan ahead and buy these upfront as regular train fares in Japan are apparently pretty pricey.

As two weary South West Trains commuters, we were both overjoyed to hear that there is an annual average delay of less than one minute per trains – do you hear that SWT? Less than ONE MINUTE on average. Apparently if the train is delayed for five minutes, the conductor makes an announcement profusely apologising for the delay, you might even be handed a ‘delay certificate’. If they’re delayed for more than an hour, it might appear in the newspaper. That’s right, it would be newsworthy if a train were to be delayed by such a time. Sorry for harping on about this but, we cannot wait to try out an efficient train line!

Some useful information about the JR passes

• They need to be ordered from your country of origin before you set off.
• We got ours here.
• You need to exchange the order(s) for the ticket within 3 months of ordering it, so don’t be too keen and book it too early!
• You don’t actually receive the train tickets in the post, you are sent exchange orders, to exchange for your ticket once you’re in Japan.

I should stress that the efficiency of the rail transport system isn’t the only reason we’re going to Japan…in fact, here’s our basic route:

• Tokyo
• Nikko
• Kamakura
• Nagasaki
• Hiroshima
• Osaka
• Nara
• Kyoto
• Tokyo

We have booked about 50% of our accommodation so far and I’m hoping to book us onto this cookery course in Kyoto, which sounds brilliant! By the time we hit our month’s countdown, we’ll hopefully have booked everything and will be focusing on the packing list and learning Japanese! I’ve got a few basic phrases down but I’d like to have a few more under my belt before we get there.

Have you been to Japan? What was your favourite place? Let us know!

L

p.s. it feels so nice to be planning adventures and blogging about travelling again!!!