Featured Posts
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A Not-So-Pale View of the Hills: Nagasaki and Beyond
16 May 2026This month`s letter is about a city that reveals itself a little more openly and asks a lot less physically than Tokyo, leaving more room for the emotional weight it carries. With its deep wounds still visible, yet powerfully contrasted by the vibrancy of everyday life, it is a place I find myself returning to again and again: Nagasaki. From there, the trip extends beyond the city itself to the Goto Islands, Amakusa, and the Shimabara Peninsula.
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Walking Kumano Kodo: The Imperial Route
20 Apr 2026Notes from and planning guidance for the Nakahechi Route of the Kumano Kodo, the best-known of the ancient pilgrimage routes crossing the Kii Peninsula. Following forested mountain paths between historic villages and sacred shrines, it offers a journey through one of Japan's most spiritually significant landscapes.
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Seasons of Japan: When Is the Best Time to Visit?
07 Dec 2025The eternal question: When is the best time to visit Japan? An overview of each season from a pros-and-cons perspective including summer, which is admittedly a hard one to approach from the “pro” side.
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A Literary Journey Across Japan: From Hokkaido to Okinawa
17 May 2026A fast-paced literary journey across Japan, featuring books to accompany your travels as you move from region to region. Organized by city and area, it begins in Hokkaido and gradually makes its way south to Okinawa, introducing novels, memoirs, travel writing, collection of essays, and other works connected to each destination along the way.
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Japan Travel – Frequently Asked Questions
10 May 2026Ten answers to the most common Japan travel questions. The post covers best season to visit, transportation tips including now a little infamous Japan Rail Pass, hot springs experiences and destinations beyond Tokyo and Kyoto.
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Dreamy Hot Springs of Japan
20 Mar 2025Five minutes—well, honestly, not even that long. More often, just a quick dip, and running out of the bath in a matter of seconds to get dressed and leave the facilities as if a mob is after me. This was how I was doing “onsen” (hot springs) in Japan when I first moved here.
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Shibu Onsen and the Snow Monkeys of Nagano
05 Feb 2026A weekend stay in Shibu Onsen where overnight stayers get key to the village`s nine different baths, and the first encounter with Nagano`s most famous residents - snow monkeys.
Islands of Japan
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Islands of Japan Worth Ditching the Mainland For
07 Dec 2025Japan is an island nation. Now, please repeat with me - Japan is an island nation. And now, again, but this time in Japanese - Japan is a "shimaguni." In his excellent book about Japan - Bending Adversity, David Shilling refers to the term shimaguni (島国）- meaning island country in Japanese, as "incantation," as a magic term to end all conversations about Japan.
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Yakushima: Land of Beautiful Hikes
17 Dec 2025Planning a trip to Yakushima is very easy thanks to the abundance of the high quality websites focusing on the island and its hiking trails. Even a quick browse through those various sites is sufficient to ensure you that Yakushima is the right choice as the sense of attachment the page owners feel to this mystical island jumps out of almost every page of their websites.
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Okinawa, the Reluctant Paradise
15 Jul 2025On a blue-sky day, the scenery on Tokashiki, with its perfectly balanced color palette and just the right contrast between the ocean and the lush hills that surround it, feels like something out of an anime, dreamed up by an artist almost mocking us with a glimpse of a perfect island world that could never exist. But the greatest thing about Kerama Islands of Okinawa is the simple fact that the islands do not seem to care about their own greatness, at least not from a typical tourism perspective.
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Walking Goto Islands: a Travel Diary
16 Mar 2024I am writing this sitting in my room at Hostel Ta Bi To, in the tiny town of Tomie on Fukue Island, the largest of the five islands of Goto Islands Archipelago. This is the first of my travel diaries that I plan to post on a daily basis during my nine-day stay in Goto Islands, where I plan to do some island hopping and walking as much as I can.
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Sadogashima Island Traverse Hike: Forests, Ridges and Strange Things
07 Sep 2025Sagodashima Island traverse hike was full of surprises. Some purely pleasant and some pleasantly strange surprises.
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Japan`s Most Beautiful Island: Rebun in Hokkaido
31 Mar 2026Rebun Island, located off the northern coast of Hokkaido, is the most picture-perfect island, if not the place, that I have been to in Japan.
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Kerama Blue: Tokashiki and Zamami Islands of Okinawa
14 Apr 2026Quick notes for those planning a summer trip to Kerama Islands of Okinawa.
Japan Trip Planning Tips
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Japan Travel Guide: Cities, Islands, Hot Springs, Hikes
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Japan Trip Planning Q&A – Miscellaneous
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Japan Trip Planning Q&A – Accommodation
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Japan Trip Planning Q&A – Transportation
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Tokyo Museums: Your Best Friend on a Rainy Day
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Fall Colors Trip to Aomori
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Kyoto Tips: Where to Stay, Eat and What to See
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Best Hostels in Japan: Stylish and Budget Friendly Options
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Shinkansen Guide: Passes, Discounts and More
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One Fine Autumn Day in Kyoto
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One Fine Day in Kanazawa
JAPAN TRAVEL NEWSLETTER - LETTERS FROM JAPAN: ITINERARY SUGGESTIONS & TRIP DIARIES & PLANNING INFO
While this website is the main platform where I publish travel-related content, I also run a Japan-focused newsletter called Letters from Japan. Once a month, I share a letter featuring travel stories and photography from across the country. One of the recent letters, “Reading Japan: From Hokkaido to Okinawa,” presents a selection of books that can accompany a journey through Japan in geographical order. // There are also paid subscription options, which provide access to additional posts designed to support Japan itinerary planning with a more logistics-focused and information-heavy approach. These include the Japan Trip Planning Q&A Series, covering topics such as transportation and accommodation, as well as specific trips like biking the Shimanami Kaido in two days. // Another category includes the “One Fine Day” city series, covering Kanazawa, Tokyo, and Kyoto, each offering a walking itinerary through the city. There are also several multi-day itinerary suggestions based on my own trips, such as “Blue Forests of Japan: Autumn Trip to Aomori,” which shares my annual fall foliage journey to the northernmost prefecture of Tohoku; “Tohoku Onsen Hopping,” introducing several historic hot spring stays in the region; and a weekend trip to Shibu Onsen and the snow monkeys of Nagano. // Paid subscribers also have access to the Travel Diaries series, whose recent entries include a week-long winter trip to Hokkaido, Walking Goto Islands off the coast of Nagasaki, and a five-day hike along the Kyoto Trail. // The structure of the paid archive and the different categories of posts are explained in more detail on the Letters from Japan Resource Page. // If you would like to subscribe, you can use the form at the bottom of this page or click here.
