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Lonely Planet Japan Editorial Review:
The electric chaos of Tokyo or the tranquil wilderness of Hokkaido? Osaka's street culture or Kyoto's shrines and Zen gardens? From Ginza's bright lights to the 88 Temples of Shikoku, with this guide and a bullet train you can see it all.
• Japanese script throughout • extensive menu glossary covering all styles of Japanese cuisine • wide range of sleeping options from opulent ryokan to capsule hotels • over 150 maps, most with Japanese script to aid navigation • illustrated special section on art and architecture • language chapter to help you tell your setto from your sento
Customer Reviews:
Strangely Annoyed
I have lots of guidebooks - and lots of Lonely Planets, for that matter. But despite the fact that they say they are for "independent travellers", I keep finding ridiculous reviews on restaurants and hotels, to the point where I've stopped using them.
The History, Snapshot, and similar sections are great, but if you have a brain of your own - use it. Forget their restaurant and hotel recommendations, as I'm not even sure they visit the places. Sometimes they have history or comments on places that is worthwhile to read, though. All tourbooks may have these drawbacks, to be fair.
Finally, I think I'm going to stop buying Lonely Planet's, though. First, they always act like driving is so scary everywhere, when it's actually quite easy to anyone with a brain. They also forget to give worthwhile tips on getting a car, etc. I imagine that this is their way of "saving the Earth". To a person who does care about the Earth, but doesn't believe that being a dirty hippie is going to save anything, this - and all their other BS trying to coerce their opinions onto you as fact - gets really freakin' old. Yes, yes, I know, LP is founded by some hippie freak from AUS or something - whooptie doo. That doesn't mean I have to pay some jerk who's going to push his politics on me, whether I agree with them or not.
A great purchase
I found this guide very helpful. I travelled to Japan 10 years ago but this was a fully guided trip, and i was a school student.
This time around, my husband and I did all the planning ourselves. Lots of information, would be perfect for someone who has never travelled to Japan before.
Errors in this book
I always buy LP series whenever I travel to Asia and Europe. I bought a previous edition and the current edition of Lonely Planet Japan over the past 4 years. It helped me get around Japan without a problem. But for those who can't speak Japanese or can't recognize kanji, this book has serious errors that might send you to a different place. An example is that in both editions they messed up the kanji vs the English for Asakusa (historical district) and Akasaka (business district). These are completely different areas of Tokyo, you're in trouble if you're showing this to a taxi driver or someone on the street. Another example is the kanji symbol for bathroom is wrong. For someone who wants to go right away, it might take you a while to find someone who can guess what you mean if you point those kanji characters at them.
Those are just a few things that I spotted so far (i only read about tokyo, nikko, and kyoto). I also don't like the restaurant recommendations in this book. First of all, if a restaurant is in this review then most likely everyone will go there. The best about japan is that you can stroll around little alleys next to skyscrapers and will run into a neighborhood restaurant that's good and cheap. the price they listed for the so-called cheap restaurants are almost doubled the price of what I can get in a big city like Tokyo. Makes me wonder if those writers actually lived there after all.
I would still use this book in Japan to get around, it's still quite informative and entertaining to read. but for those who can't speak japanese or recognize their written characters, I suggest you bring another book with you.
A good guide for traveling on-your-own.
The 8th edition is 150 pages less than the 7th. What did they cut out? Hokkaido, Tohoku, and hotels seem to be trimmed in a lot of areas. For example, Kushiro got cut to a bare mention and Onuma National Park north of Hakodate no longer made the list. If you want to see the Ainu Museum in Shiraoi, it's still in there but you're going to have to stumble across it in a box listed under "Ainu Rennaisance." I suppose Tokyo-Kyoto is what sells so if you cut, then do it far away from these two areas.
The budget hotel listing has gotten thin, and this was the main content I liked to use. Many times, the only budget accomodation listing is the Youth Hostel. Many times there are only 1 or 2 listings after the YH, but the price is high. I know there are lots more budget options, but I also know the best lists for budget lodgings are obtained at the information center in town. Why couldn't they check out some on that list and put them in the book? You're now better off checking the web before you go or waiting until you get to the info booth near the train station to get a complete list and find something that meets your budget.
I suppose some people use the restaurant listings but I can't comment. However, I usually eat at a place that's near to wherever I am at meal time. I also like the listing of the few 'gaijin' hangouts; most of the clientele are Japanese anyway.
There are complaints on the lack of information on the banking system. It's all in this edition. My guess is a reviewer got caught out after hours and got ticked off. Banks are open until 3, M-F; you're better off checking out the Post Offices which are open until 5/6 PM. ATMs close with the bank or post office. All this is in this edition, you just have to read it. I cash enough money at one time for 3-5 days worth of hotels and expenses. Credit cards won't pull you through in this country.
The maps are either small scale or generalized. They're good for getting you to a place if not around it. I've found most of the maps in both the RG and LP very similar. The Let's Go maps are a bit better due to being bilingual, but they're the same scale. It's best if you pick up a local map upon arrival. Even some of these aren't too good either, and can leave off many smaller roads and streets. If you want a good map, I've found that I have to buy the atlas-type book for the area of interest in a bookstore or a highway rest area. There are several brands, such as "Mapple," and they are arranged by 'ken' or prefecture. Some come with both romaji (western European characters) and Japanese. You just have to page through them to see what you can read. The best are only in Japanese but they are detailed down to the traffic signals.
All in all, this guide is for the individual traveler who is traveling mostly by a JR Rail Pass. It covers more places than any other guide, and in doing such doesn't have space to give a long history, photos (Eye Witness Guides), or a long history or stories about each stop. If you need the history included in the guide, look to one of the others. The Rough Guide covers fewer places but has more of the background on each place, and is popular for this reason. If the places you're going are all covered in the RG, then use that one. If you're going to Tokyo and Kyoto, you can look to the Frommers, Fodor, or Eye Witness guides which is almost all history, culture, and pictures, or just get the LP-Tokyo guide.
This guide is for practical information: finding a hotel, getting around, and getting to the places you want to see. It's not for the "drive-only" or "tour-group" individual traveller, as the former will be everywhere that not listed in any travel book, and the information for a tour type trip is thin. It's pretty good at fulfilling it's niche except for the diminished hotel listings in the budget range. Because of the thinned hotel listings, I drop a star.
Also look at: Rough Guides Japan; Let's Go Japan; Moon Guides Japan. These are all for "on-your-own" traveling.
good for finding Japan's worst restaurants
I rented a car at Narita (Tokyo) and headed north on a 3-week road trip. This book has some reasonable hotel recommendations, even at the higher end of the price scale, but it is hard to understand how the authors of the book picked restaurants. At one Lonely Planet favorite I was served a soggy tuna sandwich that might have been found in England circa 1950. A place in Sapporo billed as serving "authentic Indian food" had nothing on the menu that I recognized from Indian restaurants in the U.S., England, or India. Finally the only restaurant in Japan where I managed to get food poisoning was a Lonely Planet suggestion.
Good on hotels, however, and the maps are helpful once you get into a city or region.
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