| A lot of this advice is out of date. - Most bank ATMs in Japan now accept foreign cards. - Credit card acceptance remains low by international standards, although things have improved a bit with the "cashless" drive. Carry cash (yen), you'll need it at many restaurants and even some hotels. - Most rail companies now sell discounted advance fares and LCC airlines are competitive as well, so a Japan Rail Pass is no longer the no-brainer it used to be, although it's still a good deal if you plan to travel a lot by train (say, Tokyo-Hiroshima and back). - Instead of calling hotels, which will be a struggle because they often won't speak much English, use Japanese booking sites like Rakuten or Jalan.net, which have thorough coverage, the best rates and functional English interfaces. Have a read through https://en.wikivoyage.org/wiki/Japan, it goes into too much detail at times but is a pretty good primer for all the things in Japan. |