Travel
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Thinking Of Going To Japan? Here’s Some Helpful Japan Trip Tips For First Timers!
Going to a new country for the first time can always be a little daunting. Figuring out what you need to take, where to stay, how to get around, what sites you want to visit, it can be a lot! I’ve been to Japan twice now, by no means am I a Japan expert, there’s always something new to learn while traveling through this amazing country. But I have picked up some random Japan trip tips that I feel may be of use for travelers that have never been there.
Choose Where In Tokyo You Want To Stay
This is assuming you’re planning on flying into Tokyo.
First, let’s figure out where exactly in Tokyo you want to stay. Tokyo is an absolutely massive city. It’s comprised of 23 special wards, 26 cities, five towns, and eight villages. Every special ward has several districts within it as well. There’s a lot of options of where to stay due to this. Like A LOT of options.
The most popular places in Tokyo are Shibuya, Shinjuku, Ginza, Roppongi. Unsurprisingly, these will also be the most expensive.
I think what’s most important is how close a subway station is to where you intend to stay. Tokyo’s infrastructure is massive and can get you anywhere in the city, no exaggeration.
So long as you’re within walking distance to ANY station and you know how to use Google Maps then what ward / district you stay in doesn’t much matter to be honest.
How long you’re staying in Tokyo, what your budget looks like, and what you want to see may ultimately influence exactly where you stay.
If you’re only in Tokyo for a couple days then you may want to stay in one of those higher profile areas if those are of interest to you, in order to maximize your time, but I don’t think it’s super necessary.
I’ve stayed in Shinagawa (first trip, has a major train station) and Taito City (second trip, cheap) and both worked out well.
When I stayed in Taito City it took 40 mins to get to Shibuya Station and 30 mins to get to Shinjuku station via subway. I was in Tokyo for five days so that amount of travel time didn’t impact my decision on staying in Taito City. Also, on a side note it took about 15 mins to walk to Asakusa and Akihabara was a 20 min subway ride.
Choosing Which Airport To Fly Into
Tokyo has two major international airports: Haneda and Narita. It’s a little strange that one city has two international airports, but Tokyo is no ordinary major city.
The main difference between the two airports is Haneda is in Tokyo while Narita is located in Narita which is in the Chiba Prefecture, about 37 miles outside of Tokyo. Haneda provides fast access to central Tokyo, and in my opinion is a very convenient experience overall.
There’s many ways to get into the city from the airport via bus, subway, taxi. The subway will likely be the best option for most people. It’s cheaper than a taxi and faster than the bus.
Before booking that flight to Haneda, you can always check to see what the distance is from your hotel to Haneda or Narita. If you’re staying more on the outskirts of Tokyo than the airport may not make much of a difference.
For the sake of providing an example, here’s the difference from Haneda and Narita to Shinjuku Station.
Depending on what lines lines you decide to take, the trip can be as short as 40 mins from Haneda to Shinjuku Station.
From Narita, the fastest route will take over an hour to Shinjuku Station.
If the flight to Narita is a lot cheaper than Haneda than it makes sense to fly into Narita. Otherwise Haneda will be much faster generally.
Preparing For The Trip
Alright, you know where you’re staying and booked the flight, great! What are some things to pick up prior to the trip?
Get a portable phone charger/ power bank. You will be using your phone a lot. Even more than at home since you’ll be running Google Maps pretty extensively (if traveling on your own, with no tour group) and taking pics and recording videos. A portable phone charger is key so you don’t have to stress when you’re phone hits 15% and you’re far away from your hotel (we’ve all been there!).
Get an esim. If you have a newish phone you should be able to purchase an esim and you absolutely should. It will far and away be the cheaper option.
Renting a pocket wifi will run about $5.50 (USD) per day so if you’re in Japan for two weeks it will run you around $77 USD. A physical sim card will cost around $40-50 for two weeks.
I used Airailo on my last trip to Japan and got 20 GB of data for $26 USD. I was in Japan for 22 days and left with a little less than a GB of data to use. For two weeks in Japan you’d likely need about 10 GB of data. 10 GB will cost about $18. Shop around for esims. They’re cheap and easy to install. Just be sure to install prior to landing so you can just turn on the esim once you land.
An esim is definitely a much cheaper route to go when traveling in general.
Don’t worry about exchanging money prior to your visit. If flying into Haneda, they have ATM’s located throughout the airport in convenient locations. You’ll get a better exchange rate by pulling cash here as well. It’s been a few years since I flew into Narita but imagine this is the same case there as well.
No power converter is necessary (if coming from the US). Japan’s voltage is 100V. Check out the chargers you intend to take. They should have a voltage between 100-240V, those will work fine in Japan. If anything you may need a prong adapter if using a 3 prong input. I believe Japan mainly has 2 prong
inputs.
While In Japan
There’s no trash cans in Japan. Well maybe not ANY trash cans but you won’t be seeing them frequently, if it all. If you get food to go and eat in the vicinity of the restaurant you won’t see any trash cans near by. What you’ll need to do is hand the trash back to the restaurant you bought the food from to dispose of. If you’re eating on the go it’s best to store the trash in your backpack and throw it away when you get back to the hotel.
Don’t worry about the huge amounts of change you accumulate. Without a doubt you’ll be carrying around a large amount of change within days of being in Tokyo. No need to worry about that, it’s easy to get rid of. There’s vending machines literally EVERYWHERE in Tokyo. Get some beverages and put that change to good use.
My favorite was going to 7-11. You can literally dump change into a coin collector to pay for whatever you purchase. You’ll see your total amount and as you put change in that amount decreases. It’s a great way to get rid of a variety of different change amounts.
Spend money leftover money on your IC Card (rechargeable prepaid travel cards used for public transportation) . If at the end of your trip you have an ample amount left on your IC Card, there’s other ways you can spend that amount outside of public transportation. Vending machines and convenience stores (again) come in handy. They both accept IC cards as payment options.
You’ll Figure It Out
There’s a million other tips that will be helpful but the above are just little things that came to mind when first wanting to write a blog post about helpful tidbits for first time travelers to Japan. They all seemed to be scattered around but not condensed into one article or blog post. Hope it helps!
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SPICY PORK DUMPLINGS at Shinsegae Department Store Food Court in Busan
The Shinsegae Department store in Busan is a massive shopping center. I hungrily stumbled upon one of the food courts while cruising through the center near it’s closing time. It’s a shame that I found it when the department store was near closing.
The food court is HUGE. By the time I found it though most of the stalls were closed or cleaning up and closing for the night so it was slim pickings.
Fortunately, I was able to find a stall that had some dumplings. I purchased a few pork dumplings and some spicy pork dumplings.
The pork dumplings weren’t too bad but the meat filling to dough ratio was kind of lacking. It didn’t seem like there was enough filling in these. It didnt help that it was closing time and the dumplings had probably been sitting there for a decent amount of time so the fresheness factor wasn’t there either.
The filling itself had decent flavor but it was tinged with some sweetness. Not entirely sure where that was deriving from but I wasn’t a big fan of that kick. Overall the pork dumplings were decent but didn’t really stand out in any way.
The spicy pork dumpling was the same but was wrapped in a different dumpling wrapper. The spice was a pleasant surprise and had some kimchi in it which added a satisfying crunch to each bite.
Outside of that, the flavor was largely the same as the regular pork dumpling with that same small hint of sweetness. I enjoyed the spicy dumpling more than the regular one due to the spice and the crunch the kimchi added. It had a much better ratio of dumpling to filling as well.
I’d love to go back to the food court on the next visit to Busan just because there are so many options and it would be interesting to see the place bustling with hungry shopppers.
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KOREAN FRIED CHICKEN @ Gorilla Brewing Co in Busan, South Korea
I wanted to check out some local brewed beers in Busan and found Gorilla Brewing which sounded like it had a great of variety of beers on tap, which it did. I sampled a couple of the IPA’s, which were great and also put me in the mood for some fried chicken. Fortunately, fried chicken was on the menu with a couple of seasoning choices.
Gorilla Brewing Co Menu I went with the original since I just wanted plain fried chicken without any kind of sauce.
I have to say the orginal was the perfect choice. It was fried to perfection. Not oily at all. Every bite brought a very satisfying crunch. Lightly salted but very tasty. The meat was unbelievably moist.
I’m so used to fried chicken that is dripping oil and parts of the chicken being overly tough. That definitely wasn’t the case here. Probably the most moist fried chicken I’ve ever had. Served with a dipping sauce that is slightly sweet but not overly so, with a good spicy kick to it. It complemented the chicken well. The portions were amazing as well. This was a lot of chicken to work through.
If visiting Busan and craving some local brewed beers and tasty fried chicken, Gorilla Brewing is certainly worthy of a stop!
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SPICY Braised Mackeral stew in Busan, South Korea!
While walking around the Haeundae area in Busan, I stumbled upon an alley that was filled with various seafood restaurants. Taking a look at the menus, something that caught my eye was a spicy looking braised mackeral stew.
I hadn’t had it before but it looked delicious so I decided to give it a try!
One of the many tiny seafood restaurants in the area 
Braised mackeral stew! The dish comes out in a large bowl which is placed on the burner on the table and kept boiling hot. You then ladle yourself hearty servings of the delicious bubbly stew. The main dish is accompanied by a number of side dishes as well which is par for the course with any Korean meal. It’s a ton of food. There’s a good number of large, meaty chunks of mackeral in the stew.
The sauce is flavorful with a blend of different spices and is slightly spicy with a touch of sweetness, which I loved. The mackeral is tender, flaky, and really soaks up the flavor of the sauce.
Each bite is packed with flavor. The veggies in the stew also really soak up the sauce and add another texture to the dish as well.
Scooping some of the sauce along with a chunk of the mackeral and some veggies over rice was absolutely delicious and quite a comforting, filling meal.
Korean braised mackeral stew is definitely a dish that’s packed with flavor and is worth giving a try if traveling through South Korea!
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DELICIOUS DONUTS at Cafe Knotted, Busan, South Korea
Knotted is a popular donut chain in South Korea with many different types of uniques flavors in a cute cafe setting. This particular branch in Haeundae is quite new.
I definitely had a tough time choosing which ones to try since they all sounded so interesting. I went with the classic vanilla and the lemon sugar donuts. I wanted to get more but was still pretty full from a big lunch so had to settle for “just” two.
The donuts are so light and fluffy with sugar sprinkled over the outside. I could have eaten a couple more of them since they were so light to be honest. Looking back I’m disappointed I didn’t!
The donuts are chalk full of flavored vanilla and lemon cream. I was surprised after taking my first bite. Sweet, rich, and very flavorful, the vanilla and lemon cream filling were very satisfying.
Something else that makes the donuts so delicious is that they aren’t overly sweet, which it being a donut filled with flavored cream you would think it would be VERY sweet but it’s not at all.
I would definitely recommend stopping by and giving Knotted a try if you come across it during your travels through South Korea for some unique flavored donuts!
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Spicy Wheat Noodles -Yukjeon Bibim Milmyeon in Busan
While visiting Busan I made my way down to one of its most famous beaches, Haeundae. It’s a nice little walk from the subway to the beach with a main strip leading down to the beach that has shops and restaurants on both sides of the street.
On the walk to the beach I noticed a place serving cold wheat noodles which is a very popular dish in South Korea and something I definitely wanted to give a try.
They had regular wheat noodles and spicy wheat noodles so of course I had to opt for the spicy.
The presentation of the noodles is fantastic and it looks essentially like the photo on the menu.
The wheat noodles were topped with half an egg, vegetables, radish, fish, with a nice sprinkling of sesame seeds on top. The bowl of noodles is served nice and frosty. You can literally see some ice in the bowl!
The sauce is a flavorful combination of sweet, sour, and spicy, with none of the flavors being overly dominant. It all combines for a very tasty experience.
This type of noodle is definitely chewy and your jaw can certainly get a workout eating through this, lol. You get a nice mixture of the chewy noodle, with a crunch from the vegetables and another soft texture with the fish pieces.
This splendid bowl of frigid noodles definitely hit the spot on a warm day. The combination of flavors and textures made this a memorable first taste of Korean spicy wheat noodles and I look forward to grabbing another bowl of these delicious noodles!
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Jagalchi Fish Market – Busan, South Korea
The largest fish market in South Korea, Jalgachi Market is a massive, bustling market place with stalls galore, restuarants, and an insane amount and variety of seafood.
There are two large buildings housing aisle after aisle of tanks / bins of various live seafood. You can buy any of the live seafood from one of these seafood stalls and then go upstairs to a correlating restuarant (each stall has a restuarant upstairs) and they will prepare the seafood for you. There’s so many different types of live fish, sea crustaceans, squid, crabs, octopus, it’s really mind boggling.
The entire surrounding area is very similar to what is housed within these buildings with shop after shop having an abundance of live seafood that can be purchased and then prepared / eaten all at the same spot.
Jagalchi area 
Shop in the Jagalchi area 
Shop in the Jagalchi area 
Shop in the Jagalchi area After walking through one of the buildings and being amazed by the sheer volume of stalls and endless aisles of aquatic tanks and bins filled with quite the assortment of aquatic wildlife, I decided that I had zero idea of what most of these creatures were, let alone how they would be prepared and what it would taste like, I wandered upstairs to where the restuarants were located to make things less complicated on myself.
I was quickly flagged down by one of the first restaurant patrons that noticed me who asked what I was looking for. They had a large fish tank with a few species of fish in it and the patron went over what kind of fish they were and how much they cost. They were fairly good sized fish. I really had no idea what they were or what they would taste like but chose one of them and got half of it sashimi style and the other half grilled.
This came with the usual side dishes that accompany pretty much all South Korean meals, kimchi, radish, etc. It also came with a few massive shrimps that were incredibly sweet.
The fish I ended up getting didn’t turn out well sashimi style. Very rubbery and chewy it wasn’t very enjoyable. I’m used to sashimi that melts in your mouth and this was certainly not that type.
The grilled fish on the other hand was very good. Freshly grilled and salted the fish was moist and had great char taste. All in all it was a ton of food that definitely left me quite full.
Walking around Jalgachi market and seeing all the different types of seafood in the market, then being able to eat such fresh fish was certainly a memorable experience. If ever visiting Busan it’s certainly a place to check out since it’s such a busy area with a lot going on!
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Soybean Sprout Soup (Kongnamulguk) – Gyeongju, South Korea
After a long day of walking around Gyeongju taking in the sights, I was definitely tired and in need of some comfort food. It was later in the afternoon in between lunch and dinner so a lot of restaurants were not open.
Fortunately, I was able to come across this small restaurant called Market Soup (not sure if that’s translated correctly).
Definitely a small place off the main road, down a random alley, which had a handful of tables. The menu was short and sweet with just a few items. I always believe places with a small menu will have delicious food because they can specialize in just a few recipes and perfect them.
I ordered the bean sprout soup with beef and was quite content with the choice.
Bean sprout soup is a very common, beloved soup in South Korea, and is also known as a hangover cure. I hadn’t tried it yet so I was eager to give it a try.
This was a good sized bowl and it came out piping hot. The broth was outstanding. Savory with mild spice to it with sesame seed. The bean sprouts were nice and crunchy and the meat was extremely tender.
Taking some of the cubed radish kimchi and putting it in the soup added even more crunch and an extra layer of flavor to the soup base.
Served with a side of rice, this was definitely a comforting meal that really hit the spot after a long day of exploring!
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Jungang Night Market, Gyeongju, South Korea
I stopped by this small food market and grabbed a quick bite at a couple of the stalls. This was just opening up so not all the stalls were up and running and there were minimal people there, which was nice!
The first stall I had was BBQ pork. Right off the grill, the pork pieces had that lovely char taste and the sauce was slighlty sweet with mild spice. The pieces were juicy and tender and very tasty. Servied on a bed of shredded cabbage, this was a delicious snack.
The second stall I had served gimbap. It’s hard to walk by a good looking gimbap so I had to give this one a try!
This particular gimbap had some lettuce and grilled pork with some chili sauce in the middle with some ground sesame sprinkled over the top.
Pretty simple ingredients within this gimbap but it was well made and solid tasting!
There were a few other stalls that were open but a lot were still setting up or not fully open yet so I didn’t get the full experience of this night market but was happy with the two stalls I stopped by!
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Sweet and Savory Coin Bread with Gooey Mozzarella Cheese In Gyeongju, South Korea
A popular snack in Gyeongju is coin bread which is a sweet and savory baked snack on a stick. There’s a fair amount of stalls that I came across selling this tasty treat.
Coin Bread stall in Gyeongju Flavor wise and consistency wise, I’d say it’s a cross between a pancake and waffle but with the huge difference it has gooey, melted mozzarella cheese in the middle and is given to you on a stick. You can never really go wrong with food on a stick right?
Coin bread! You wouldn’t necessarily think that this combination pancake / waffle with mozzarella in the middle would be the most appetizing food but the sweet and savory combo really works with this.
The pancake / waffle is soft on the inside, yet has a light, crisp, outer crunch and a solid sweetness. When you take a bite and get some of that savory, melted, stringy, mozzarella, it’s a perfect blend of flavors. I definitely could have eaten a few of these in one sitting, they’re that good!
This is definitely a unique, tasty treat in Gyeongju which I highly recommend giving a try!
