Quote:
Originally Posted by CaptainYooh
If there's only one thing you do in Kyoto it would have to be visiting Daigoji Temple. Easy public bus ride, 15 min from the city centre. Plan to spend 4-5 hours there or more, just walk the paths and prepare to be amazed.
Walking to Gion is very over-hyped and overrated. Millions of tourists from China make it unbearable.
Try to include Kamakura in your travel, even if for one day only.
If you didn't do it yet, get a 2-week Japan Rail Pass. It's for tourists only and you CAN'T buy it in Japan. It will save you hundreds of dollars.
Get a Suica card at Narita airport and put $500 on it. You will need it everywhere to pay for everything. It's like an electronic wallet.
Feel free to PM me if you have specific questions.
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While Gion is a bit of a tourist trap, I wouldn't suggest skipping it. Just, don't allocate as much time there.
The 2 week pass is a great idea. Consider also looking into a 3G sim card on the JR Pass website to combine with the JR Pass. IIRC it's all couriered anyways, so you can piggy back and save the courier cost/hassle of finding a card in Japan (which aren't cheap as everything I saw was LTE which was overkill) IMO the portable wifi are ridiculously expensive to rent online. Definitely also download specific apps to help with navigation.
$500 in one go is a bit overkill on a Suica/Pasmo. I usually add $20-50 as needed. Definitely use up your Suica before you leave the country though. I kept my emptied Suica as a souvenir. It's not exactly like a wallet though. More like a prepaid "visa" mainly used for transportation but can also be used for small purchases.
On the note of money though, as a reminder, BRING CASH. For a super technologically advanced society, I was surprised at how usage of credit cards/debit cards wasn't as common as here. Part of it is the use of suica/pasmo, but a lot of it was also just general preference for usage of cash. Bring cash. Lots of it. Japan is so safe, that wandering around with cash isn't a huge deal. Easily the safest foreign country I've ever been in by a huge margin.
To answer J Pold regarding Kyoto though
- Temples are great in the area. I hugely recommend using a day pass when you go on a long bus trip so you don't have to figure out how to calculate the bus fee and use cash. There was some weird thing where I don't think they accepted suica or pasmo for some odd reason. It's like $6 for the day for unlimited rides and it's super worth it from a convenience and time saving standpoint.
- You can do a kimono or Yukata (unsure of the temperatures there right now) dress up for a fee ($100 something bucks per?) and wander the city wearing it. HOWEVER, those wooden sandals are murderous on the feet. My smart ass response is to bring sandals in a reusable bag to swap in and out of. These places will keep your bags as a sort of collateral and you will be able to bring a shopping bag and whatever you can fit into a small bag (phone, wallet etc.) at max. See above for the bus ticket recommendation, but IMO I would not suggest more than 2-3 hours planned in that get up if you decide on it.
- Gion is a tourist trap, but IMO you shouldn't skip it. Allocate less time on it for sure though. I think about half an hour is enough to walk up and down the strip + temple at the top, but it depends on what you and your wife want. I do recommend going at night over the day though. The lights at the temple at the top look great at night.
- Monkey park closes early (Like 5:00 and last entrance 30 mins before that or something). Plan accordingly. Bamboo forest is not far from there and there's a nice temple in the vicinity too. (10 minutes by bus or 15-20 minutes walking or something like that) I didn't know this and my wife and I missed out on Monkey park
. Bamboo forest is great, but don't waste time at the opening. Walk for a solid 5-10 minutes (which tourists often don't do) and it gets dark and really cool really fast. Good place for pics (less tourists) ad more amazing than the "entrance" of the forest.
- Ryokan. If you can swing it, even if only for one night, I'd recommend it. It's not cheap, but it's a heck of an experience. I'm not sure if you plan to do this in other areas of Japan though.
- IMO the temples in the Kyoto area are nicer than Tokyo and elsewhere. Worth doing. The temple admission fee (which is technically a minimum donation for maintenance of the temples IIRC) isn't super expensive. I usually take between 15-45 minutes per temple. Depends how into the details and taking pictures you and wife are into.
- Fushimi Inari shrine (orange sticks lined pathway you may run into when searching Kyoto stuff) is cool. But IMO, don't bother going much more than 15-20 minutes if it's not specifically a thing you love. After about 15-20 minutes, it's about the same.
Also... making sure you wear appropriate footwear is HUGE in your enjoyment of Japan. There is a ridiculous amount of walking required. Look into buying some gel heel slips or having shoes that are great to walk in (ie: Hiking shoes, runners with gel slips vs slip flops).