MissMisa's and PrincessMarisa's Trip to Japan 2011
 

Hello guys!

Well, as you know I've been on Japan Forum for a number of years, picking up bits of advice, cultural tips and a little bit of the language too.

Finally I gathered enough money to go to Japan, and me and PrincessMarisa (also on the forum) will be jetting off to Japan in just over a week!

We are extremely excited about going to Japan, and I thought it'd be nice to start a thread, hopefully posting about our Japan adventures should I get the chance to do so. We'll be going for 2 weeks, spending our first week staying in Osaka and then on to Tokyo for the next week.

I'll post our itinerary up shortly, I know you guys are good at planning these things! We are planning to go to Mt Fuji, Sanrio Puroland, Osaka Castle, Osaka Bay and the Aquarium, the Sky Building, visiting areas of Tokyo, things like the Bandai Museum and a lot of other things we have planned.

Our days are pretty packed at the moment with space in the afternoon for activities that won't take a whole load of traveling.

So do you guys have any suggestions of things to do in Japan? What was your number 1 best experience in Japan - things we MUST see? Can you recommend us things to do off the typical touristy path? We are planning to visit an up-coming area of Tokyo (can't remember the name) but yeah.

Also I'd like to say thank you for the continued support I've had on Japan Forum, it's been a great help in the planning stages and I've certainly learnt a lot by being here.

You'll be right in my neck of the woods around Osaka!
I know tonnes of great places around here, if your schedule isn't already fully packed I can recommend a few if you tell me what kind of stuff you like :)

I meet a few friends next to the Sky Building every Wednesday actually :)

Oh wow that's awesome, thanks!

Well we are both females, so clearly we like shopping :D But we really want to see some interesting and underground, less-well-known places, my friend is very fond of Osaka so that's why we wanted to spend quite a bit of time there. I like art, animation (so obviously I am fond of anime) and video games, but that's not all we wanted to do. Is there anywhere you'd recommend as a vital must-see in Osaka? Or maybe something a bit less well known.

I am actually not so fond of heights, but to be honest I really want to go up the sky building to a) conquer my fear and b) see the view. I have been up the Eiffel Tower and survived, so for this I should be fine :mtongue:

まんだらけ in Umeda (one of the biggest train stations in Osaka) in the 東通商店街 is a comic book shop but what's cool is that the staff all do cosplay!
I'd pretty much avoid Umeda for shopping except for Hep5 and Est, unless you're filthy rich...
Hep5 has a huge red Ferris Wheel above it and that's nice too, the whole building is trendy fashion shops too.
Kyobashi and Namba/Shinsaibashi are a lot cheaper and have more shops though.

going from Shinsaibashi to Namba, or the other way, is great shopping, it's a really long shopping arcade and you can see Flying Man!! (iconic of the area, take a pic with it ;) )

Kyoto honestly has amazing shopping and a few of my favorite temples, including Fushimi Inari (It's got like 10000 of those red gates)

Tennoji is pretty ghetto,
USJ is where Japanese people go to feel like they're in America, so for a tourist to go there is pretty stupid lol

You said you were going to visit the aquarium in Osaka, well right next to it (like a 2second walk) is a huge Ferris Wheel and two of it's carts are entirely transparent, if you want to conquer your fear of heights, do that!

There's also an art gallery right next to the aquarium. It's a tad pricey, and it's due to be shut down soon, if you're lucky it hasn't already ><

want more?

There are two Mandarake shops in Osaka, one in Umeda, and another in Shinsaibashi. Both are great, and have (I believe) a Mother Cafe (cosplay) on the top floors. You must go to Ame-mura in Shinsaibashi/Namba.. great shopping and people watching any day of the week.

If you have a few hours, you can do an amazingly rare thing and actually get off the shinkansen in Nagoya. Almost everyone just passes through travelling between Tokyo and Osaka. :vsign:

Even if you don`t, I hope you have a wonderful trip. :)

I may just do that next year! I sped past your town four times last year on the Tokaido Shinkansen and perhaps next year I just may rectify this!

I've suscribed to the thread, and look forward to hearing about your trip! :)

As for things to do... I really loved riding the Odaiba Sky Wheel at night. You said you don't like heights though, and the wind is really quite loud up there... but if you can get the courage to do it, I'd definitely recommend it. :)
You get a lovely night view of Tokyo with all the little red flashing lights of the buildings.

Plus, they have completely clear capsules too if you feel really brave! I didn't go on a clear capsule though... I haven't too long busted my fear of heights. :L

Thanks very much for the advice everyone! Really interesting stuff. :D

For some reason I've never minded heights in Ferris Wheels, I've been on the London Eye and was fine with that. The thing I don't like are suspended staircases and things where it's possible to fall over the edge. :p

By the way, the forecasted weather is terrible (I know it's rainy season) how is the weather in Japan at the moment? What can I expect when I get there? I would have liked to have gone in April but exams/university meant I couldn't.

It appears a typhoon is headed towards Japan or it will skirt its south/east coast.:(

I hope you have good wather for your trip, though. The weather gods were good to me on both Japan visits and only cried one day each trip.