Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
For more modern-style hotels, expect to pay around $40 USD per night for a room that comes with a bed
and shared shower. However, the price depends heavily on the location. Hotels in Osaka can cost as little as
$20 USD for a single room while the cheapest hotel room you can find in Tokyo is often around $40 USD.
Countryside hotels are also on the lower end.
Then there are the capsule hotels, which are exactly like they sound. You sleep in a little tiny pod. It's
like being in a coffin or a space capsule in a sci-fi movie. You share bathrooms and common areas and your
capsule has a light, outlet, and maybe a small television. They are frequently used by businessmen who work
late and miss the last train home. They are a little weird to stay in, and if you aren't comfortable in tight
spaces, they probably won't be for you. One night in them was all I could take, but it's definitely a unique
experience and an inexpensive option for solo travelers. Capsule hotels begin around $27 USD per night.
Booking sites like Agoda and Booking.com have the best rates in Asia for large hotels and are my go-to
search sites. Rakuten Travel (travel.rakuten.com) is a Japan-only website that features smaller and more tra-
ditional hotels not found on the large booking sites.
Apartment Rentals
There are better options than apartment rental sites, but if you want an apartment, you'll find very limited
options outside the major cities. In Tokyo, as of 2014, Airbnb lists over 1,000 private rooms and 180 shared
rooms, while the smaller site Roomorama shows 473 listings in greater Tokyo.
The lack of available options in such a large megacity is because Japanese culture is very private and
most apartments are very small, so you can't really have houseguests. Most people just don't have a spare
room. As such, if you are traveling as a group, apartment rentals can be a really good option because renting
entire apartments is fairly easy but for solo or couple travelers, you'll be hard-pressed to find private rooms.
Solo travelers can rent one of the very limited beds for between $25 USD and $35 USD a night around
the country. Entire apartments range from $100 USD and up per night.
Camping
Camping is allowed in Japan only in national parks. There are more than 3,000 campsites scattered all over
the country, owned and managed by local municipalities. Metropolitan areas don't have campsites, so don't
expect to camp anywhere other than in the woods. In the national parks, camping outside the designated
areas is strictly prohibited.
Hospitality Exchanges
Hospitality exchanges are not as widespread in Japan as elsewhere in the world, but there is a small but act-
ive Couchsurfing community in the country (26,000 members in spring 2014). Couchsurfing simply is not
a part of Japanese culture, and many people do not feel comfortable hosting strangers. Most of the hosts on
the hospitality websites are younger. Many of the Couchsurfing profiles I saw were foreigners or Japanese
who had been overseas.
There are not many hosts outside the big cities, so make sure you request rooms well ahead of time to
increase your odds of success as the response rate is often very low.
WWOOF
WWOOF Japan (wwoofjapan.com) has hundreds of hosts all over the country. WWOOFing is very, very
new to Japan so there are not that many options, but you'll find a variety of farms, health centers, and tradi-
tional homesteads looking for workers. To WWOOF in Japan, you will need a work visa.
