My wife and I are spending 15 days in Japan next month. We will be in Tokyo, Hakone, Hiroshima, Osaka and Kyoto. We are looking at dining options. There are plenty of inexpensive restaurants and reasonable street food options.
I started to look at nicer restaurants and the budgets are $125 to $600 per person. I’m not spending $1000 for dinner for 2. Any suggestions or thoughts.
It has been nearly thirty years since my wife and I visited Japan. We rank that as our favorite trip of all time.
Kyoto and Nara were my two favorite places. Kyoto was not targeted for bombing during the war and much of the cultural heritage of ancient temples and streets was saved. Kiyojmizu is a hilltop temple complex with a large platform overlooking the City. Try getting there in the evening when the ravens and birds from all over the City come to roost. Arthur C Clarke described it in one of his novels, I guess like me he was awed by the place.
We walked thru a neighborhood in Nara ,the ancient capital, near the temple complex where some of the largest wooden buildings in the world are located, and found a great tiny tea house on a side street. Dont miss the local places and try to get off the tourist routes.
I suggest lots of exploring and walking if you can. You will find good places to eat, off the tourist routes, that are less expensive than the "recommended" guidebook places. I do not believe you have to go to expensvie places. Frequent the places the Japanese go to and try the things they eat and drink. I remember going into one tavern and asking the bartender for whatever he would recommend from the kitchen. It was fresh fish and vegetables and absolutely delicious.
It is good you are taking 15 days. Tokyo is impossible to see in two or three days. It is twice the size of New York City. Osaka is all concrete and it was one of the few places where we made no lasting memories, other than the giant underground mall in the center of the City.
Hakone was a treat. We arrived there by bus at night. I remember the bus taking winding roads and not seeing much until the next morning. The mountain views are memorable. We stayed in a Japanese ryokan and slept on rice mats. In the morning we opened the window to look out at the scenery and a clutch of quail below. The lake at the foot of the mountain has a 17th century type sailing ship crossing it.
BTW, I recommend the Japanese style ryokan motels. It was different, but enjoyable.
I would also recommend getting a Japan rail pass. Their rail is fast, even without the bullet train option, clean and convenient. Bus connections were easy.
One experience I had was spending a few hours in a Japanese self serve laundry to clean some things. In the laundry an alcoholic WW2 vet befriended me. He thought I was John Wayne.
Another embarrassing experience.. My wife speaks Japanese and I asked her to teach me how to say, "Hello, my name is ________". In the morning when I went to the mens steam room and communal bath I used the phrase, trying to be friendly. I was met with strange looks. At the end of the trip I told that to a friend of my wife. He looked at me and said, "Excuse me for telling you this, but you speak Japanese like a woman or an effeminate man". Apparently my wife taught me how to speak in an overly polite phrasing as a woman would. Apparently wherever I went I left behind a legend of a large gay American who liked to shake hands and get too friendly.
= ahole.
