Twelve years after first setting foot in Japan I made it back (this time with Stephanie!), and the country and its people charmed me all over again.

We visited Tokyo, Jigokudani, Kyoto, hiked on the Kumano Kodo, finally spent a lazy few days on the Izu Peninsula. Hiking the ancient pilgrimage route on the Kumano Kodo was particularly special, so I made that a separate post, which you can find here. I’ll tell you about all the rest here.

Tokyo

Forty million
People live drink love fuck die
Each on their own path

I had probably the tastiest ramen I’ve ever eaten at Kyushu Jangara Akihabara. The place is tiny: the whole restaurant, including the kitchen and bathroom, would fit in an American living room. There’s cramped seating for only twelve or so customers, and the menu is short - just a few types of ramen, plus options for what toppings you want. Despite this, there’s usually a line outside. And for good reason: the ramen is that great.

If you go to Tokyo, check it out. You might also visit Ramen Nagayama, right by the Tokyo National Museum. My brother Marek says this hole in the wall spot has the best ramen he ever had. If you try both, do let me know which one is better :). I planned to do this important research myself, but ultimately didn’t make it to Ramen Nagayama due to inclement weather and an allegedly waterproof jacket that turned out to be anything but.

An experience Stephanie and I both enjoyed was visiting the teamLab Planets museum. To say that this was way, way better than the Van Gogh Immersive Experience in LA is a massive understatement. If you’re in Tokyo, check it out.

Jigokudani

In a mountain spring
In a lover’s sweet embrace
We’re all seeking warmth

Kyoto

Come, wandering soul
Get lost in my narrow streets
Temple to temple

Kyoto is a special little city of tiny alleys and enormous temples. Wandering its streets at night is a magical experience. It’s amazing where the locals manage to squeeze their tiny kei cars (and bicycles and scooters).

The big temples are beautiful, but there might be even more magic at the little ones you happen across as you wander aimlessly. A few times we happened upon a small yet well-kept temple, and we were the only ones there.

Izu Peninsula

Izufornia
Take the best from three great spots
Sun, sand, wind, and stars

The Izu Peninsula is a three hour drive southwest from Tokyo. To get to its southern coast, one must make their way through the peninsula’s mountainous center, and on the other side it feels like a different world. The locals brand it as “Izufornia”, and indeed it feels like a mix of Japanese, Californian, and Hawaiian cultures.

People wear Hawaiian shirts, and Hawaiian music plays in hotels and stores. But the local souvenir store also sells UCLA shirts and California-branded items. And best of all, the beach in front of our hotel in Kawazu has beautiful, soft sand. It’s the only sandy beach we saw during our trip to Japan, and here’s how excited I was to go for a swim:

Our stay in Izufornia was a nice, relaxing coda to our trip. The pace was slower.

The intimate restaurants in Japan are a nice experience I haven’t had elsewhere. Some of them fit only six customers. A pleasant aspect of this is that in these tiny places the chef prepares food right in front of you, and you get to interact with him. This is trickier when your Japanese is limited to touristy phrases, but you can make it work with a little bit of extra determination, patience, and creativity. We had nice experiences like this in a few places in Tokyo, Kyoto, and the Izu peninsula.

I asked the owner of Donburyia if we could add our signatures to his wall; he said sorry, that’s only for movie stars. I told him Stephanie is a movie star, and he made the greatest face of pleased shock I’ve ever seen, something right out of anime. After a brief check of IMBD, he handed Stephanie a sharpie. If you visit, find our names on the wall.

We visited the Kawazu Seven Waterfalls, on the Kawazu River, which was pretty.

The local area is famous for its wasabi, and small restaurants near the waterfall offer various dishes based on it. I got some soba noodles. The wasabi comes as a full root on the side, and you get a small grater to add as much as you like, the way you might do with parmesan in an Italian restaurant. Here’s what it looks like.

Travelling in Japan is surprisingly expensive, regardless of the means - trains and buses and cars are all much pricier over long distances than compared to North America or Europe, I think. Maybe because the country is so mountainous, so infrastructure is extra expensive. There are so many tunnels in so many places.

Food, on the other hand, is cheap by American standards - Stephanie and I paid $35 for all the delicious sushi and sashimi we could eat in a conveyor belt sushi place in Gose on the way to the Kumano Kodo.

Another highlight: 7-Eleven has smoothies - you buy a cup of frozen fruit for two bucks, stick it in a machine, and push a button. The machine adds some water and blends your fruit right in the cup. The result is tasty, cheap, and widely available. I can’t wait for these to come to the US.

No trip to Japan could be complete without a good look at Mt. Fuji, so on the drive back to Haneda Airport, we stopped at Jukkoku Pass and took the funicular to the peak to enjoy that famous view:

We also got a similar view from the famous viewpoint on Lake Ashi. I think this is the universe telling us we should come back :)