Travel Tips

Yokohama's Minato Mirai area is where you'll find Yokohama Stadium. With capacity for around 30,000 people, this is home to sporting events, music concerts, and more. Minato Mirai is also home to huge convention and event spaces like PACIFICO Yokohama and Pia Arena MM.
When your event's finished, don't let the fun stop there! Our selection of places to stay includes hotels offering party plans, spaces for groups of friends to get together, and even rooms with huge TVs!
Even if your event happens to be at Nissan Stadium or Yokohama Arena – both of which are in Shin-Yokohama – you can get to this area very easily.
And the best part is, all of the hotels in our list have convenient access to train or subway stations.
1. Forest Hotel Pasela: Offering everything you need for an Oshikai Party!
Forest Hotel Pasela offers a stay as though you are at a resort surrounded by forest! It’s about a 30-minute train ride from the Yokohama Arena, adjacent Shin-Yokahama Station, an..

Himeji Castle is a national treasure located in Himeji City, Hyogo Prefecture. To this day, Himeji Castle still retains its beautiful appearance, especially the Keep, which was constructed in 1609, and tourists from around the world come here not only to appreciate its historical value but also to see beautiful traditional Japanese scenery.
Here we will introduce what to see in Himeji Castle and also the superb scenery to be enjoyed at Koko-en Garden.
Getting to Himeji Castle
Himeji Castle is about a 20-minute walk from JR Himeji Station. The castle sits atop Himeyama from where it could observe all the doings in the town and has become a symbol of Himeji City.
Himeji Castle History
▲ You can see the Main Keep from the moment you enter the Himeji Park located on the grounds of Himeji Castle
Himeji Castle was designated a UNESCO World Cultural Heritage Site in 1993, the first-ever in Japan, and is also a designated National Treasure and an Important Cultural Property noted for being a m..

Sapporo is the capital city of Hokkaido Prefecture and a major tourist destination. As it's home to a huge snow festival and with great access to the rest of Japan's northernmost island, many visitors will travel from Tokyo to Hokkaido.
So, what is the best way to get from Tokyo to Hokkaido? Though the two areas are around 820km apart, Tokyo and Sapporo are actually well connected to each other. Whether you favor speed, budget, the route and its sights, or even a specific vehicle, we've got you covered.
1. Flights from Tokyo to Hokkaido (Sapporo)
The fastest way to get from Tokyo to Hokkaido is by airplane to Sapporo. Every day about 80 flights travel from the airports of Haneda and Narita to the New Chitose Airport, in a trip that takes about 1 hour and a half.
The ticket usually goes for 20,000-30,000 yen, but it’s possible to find cheaper options with earlier reservations or with less strict travel days/times.
Browse & Book Now ▶ Flights from Tokyo to Hokkaido
You ca..

If you've ever visited a restaurant and thought to yourself “why aren't there more cheese-based dishes on the menu?”, then a great place to check out is Cheese Cheers Cafe. The chain has several branches in Japan, including one within just a few minutes on foot from Hibiya Station in Tokyo.
The concept of the restaurant was to create dishes for cheese lovers, by cheese lovers, and the menu definitely delivers on that. Some of the highlights include a creamy, cheesy risotto, a Bolognese pasta topped with a tower of Bella Lodi (a type of Italian hard cheese), various pizzas including a four cheese variety, and a carbonara made with Mimolette (a cheese that originates from Lille in France). There are also a number of meat dishes that come topped with cheese, including the Japanese staple of hamburger steak.
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Even the desserts here take on a cheese theme, and one of the most popular items is the CCC cheesecake – it's designed to look just like..

In the beautiful, rural town of Biei in Hokkaido, Shikisai-no-Oka is a perfect representation of the beautiful scenery here. From spring to autumn, you can enjoy colorful stripes of flowers that are drawn over the hills.
In winter, the flower garden turns to a world of silvery snow and there are many activities to be enjoyed. Please continue reading to learn about the different ways to enjoy this area throughout the year with respect to activities, food, and lodging.
What is Shikisai-no-Oka?
Located in the hilly area at the foot of the Tokachidake mountain range in Daisetsuzan, Hokkaido, Biei Town attracts many people with its beautiful scenery of rolling, hilly fields.
In this breathtaking patchwork landscape, you can enjoy a vast flower field of about 150,000 square meters. A particularly beautiful spot is the Shikisai-no-Oka flower fields, when, from late April to late October, about 30 kinds of flowers are in full bloom.
Getting to Shikisai-no-Oka from Sapporo
When using public t..

The Nebuta Matsuri in Aomori is a festival where giant floats, called “Nebuta,” carrying larger-than-life figures of warriors and demons, march down the streets.
One of the three great Japanese festivals of the Tohoku region, the Nebuta Matsuri draws crowds of 2.5 million people every year, painting the summer nights with vibrant colors. Just catching the parade is an enjoyable activity in and of itself, but learning about its roots, and jumping in to take part in the festival will make for a once-in-a-lifetime experience!
Here, we’ll share ways to get there for first-timers and how best to enjoy the Aomori Nebuta Matsuri.
What is Aomori Nebuta Matsuri?
The Aomori Nebuta Matsuri is one of the leading and most traditional summer festivals in Japan, taking place every August.
The “Nebuta” are giant lanterns, which can be as large as five meters in height and nine meters in length, and the lanterns, on floats, make their way around the city area, near JR Aomori Station.
Visitors from n..

As the spread of the Omicron variant finally started to quell, Japan finally lifted the Quasi-State of Emergency, which called for self-isolation and shorter business hours, on March 21, 2022.
And it's not only Japan. Countries all around the globe have gradually started to ease up restrictions. Naturally, many have also begun to wonder if and when they could travel to Japan again. However, the rules and details concerning immigration can be a little complicated to understand.
So in this article, based on government resources, we'll explain everything you need to know about travel to Japan, from entry conditions and necessary documentation, to mask requirements and the current state of Covid-19 in Japan.
*Information as of July 15, 2022
main image: PIXTA
Is Japan open to tourists? What are the requirements for entering Japan?
Image source: PIXTA
As of July 15, 2022, the Japanese government has developed new entry restrictions and quarantine measures for foreign nationals who ..

Bittersweet is not always a passive emotion, even though the conflict between the highs of sweetness and the lows of despair gives it an averaged-out feeling of conflicted ambiguity. It is a bit like having your feet buried in ice and your head in the sauna, so in reality, you do feel the intensity of both emotions. To me, bittersweet is biting your lips until they bleed, in an attempt to stop yourself from an uncontrolled blabber of tears. It is that intense. It reminds me of the word sayonara, for which the word farewell doesn’t do it justice. The word Sayonara literally means “if this must be it, then so it must be.” It reflects the sentiment of the longing and pain of having to part ways.
Ono and the Tale of a Hundred Nights The word bittersweet summarises the life of Ono no Komachi (小野小町), who like Cleopatra, was one of the three classical beauties in Japan. She was born in faraway Akita and sent to the Imperial Court when she was twelve. While far from home, her beauty and poetr..

In recent years the deliciousness of Japanese fruit has been attracting attention overseas. Among the sought-after fruits, melons have gained popularity as a high-class fruit.
Various kinds of melons are grown throughout Japan, and prices range from inexpensive ones for everyday consumption to high-end melons intended for gift-giving.
Here’s everything you need to know about Japanese melons, from the different varieties to when and how to eat them.
1. What kind of melons are grown in Japan?
Ibaraki Prefecture has the largest growing area and the highest production of melons, with about 40,000 tons harvested annually. Kumamoto and Hokkaido produce about 20,000 tons, and the rest of these relatively easy-to-grow fruits are cultivated from Tohoku to Kyushu.
Japanese muskmelons, considered a high-class fruit, are both fragrant and delicious and characterized by the net-like pattern of their surface. Varieties with green flesh include Earls melon and Andean melon, while Yubari melons and ..

Sugar gets a very bad reputation. Aside from causing tooth decay, sugar is blamed for obesity, chronic acne, type 2 diabetes, increased risk of heart disease, cancer, and mood disorders.
But the truth is, sugar from the right sources can be nutritious, and gasp, even healthy!
Okinawa kokuto is, in technical terms, the non-centrifugal sugar made by boiling down cane juice using traditional methods. Impurities are removed in the boiling process. The cane juice condenses and when poured into metal trays, it naturally solidifies (no coagulating agents were used). Kokuto tastes like molasses. For the curious, the granulated sugar we are familiar with is centrifugal sugar. A kilogram of sugarcane usually produces 140 g of non-centrifugal sugar (kokuto) and 120 g of centrifugal sugar (raw sugar). Okinawa's method of producing kokuto came from Fuzhou, China, another evidence of the strong historical ties between Okinawa and China.
Aside from energy giving sucrose, kokuto is a source of..