VAN LIFE IN JAPAN: Exploring Hidden KYOTO in 3 Days

VAN LIFE IN JAPAN: Exploring Hidden KYOTO in 3 Days

in this episode we’re leaving the hustle 
of Osaka behind and hitting the road for   a 3-day camper van trip through Kyoto Prefecture 
first stop Japan’s largest freshwater lake Lake Biwa before venturing deep into the countryside 
we’ll explore charming lesserknown towns discover a hidden Jess Cafe and the surprisingly good 
conveyor belt sushi spot and take in some of   the most stunning sites from Shirahiji Shrine 
rising from the water to the breathtaking Amanohashidat sandbar and the unique waterfront 
village of Vin we’re also sharing our experience of traveling Japan by camper van where to park 
how to find places to sleep and what to expect   on the road it’s raw scenic and full of 
unexpected moments so let’s go hello and welcome to a new episode from Japan today is 
the start of a new adventure here because we just rented a camper van and we are heading on 
a 3 days road trip not too far from Osaka but we are going to visit some very beautiful and 
special locations so stay tuned i will give   you a tour of the camper van once we reach the 
supermarket because we want to buy some groceries [Music] hey [Music] We just finished with the grocery shopping and 
uh now I thought I should give you a quick tour of our camper because I don’t know if when we 
will reach the camping or the place where we’re   sleeping tonight is going to be light with all the 
traffic we still have two more hours anyway this is the camper the home a low roof camper van 
with plenty of space i mean compared to what we’ve seen before as you can see I’m seated like 
this so you can see and if I sit down it’s super good as you seen before we have these two sofas 
that will become actually three sofas it’s like a living room i mean when the bed is not made it 
seems that here can fit eight persons in the back just when And also we have here a table that 
is not installed yet but it’s a middle table here yeah but if you want to sleep here I think 
two adults and one kid not more but like this super spacious below this one is a storage space 
with some kitchen stencils that we will use later here something technical we have a microwave 
here more storage here more storage and also you have a sink oh and we have a sink here yeah 
a sink and you have a lot of lights that we’re going to see later another compartment a window 
very nice yeah you have also shades for your privacy you have shades here also in the front 
you have shade yeah I can sit here in the back where Alex drives and he doesn’t know right 
here when you stay in the night privacy you have a lot of plugs you have the normal ones 
and also you have more 220 power here in the back wow oh and there USB here yeah USB lights 
everywhere so it’s a complete show here it’s nice [Music] after more than two hours we are 
finally in the area of Lake Niwa this is the largest freshwater lake in Japan and also 
one of the oldest lakes in the world it took us a bit longer because we wanted to avoid the 
tall road and we took the longer route we will try to spend the night somewhere around here 
we are looking for a campsite but unfortunately uh we planned this super spontaneously so 
it’s really hard to find a campsite so as an advice you need to plan this in advance 
and reserve the spot for your camper van or for your tent we are now at Shirahiji Shrine 
this is a temple founded almost 2,000 years ago and it’s super famous because of its toy 
gate in the water which the legend says that it was built first on land and now it sank and 
this temple is dedicated to the god of longevity actually Shiraij if I’m pronouncing it correctly 
means white bird so the symbol of longevity [Music] as this is a Shinto shrine we find here the 
Tory gates that represent the crossing from the worldly to the divine and these are the places 
of worship and because the Shinto religion is so connected to the nature even the trees in the 
forest surrounding the temple are considered sacred and uh they were marked being wrapped 
with a rope usually I read that this rope is beige but here they are using blue rope and 
they actually think that in some of the trees uh deities can leave plot twist guys we 
decided we will not sleep at a campsite but instead we’ll use the facilities of roadside 
parking i’ll show you to you soon but since we won’t be able to cook and to make a fire in 
the parking lot it would be weird we decided to come for a sushi place right and here we 
are it’s called Hama Sushi we never had This is actually We’ve never had this before 
yeah it’s new for us sushi the sunset is super beautiful the camper van is waiting for 
us let’s go let’s eat good vibes good vibes oh my god i can’t believe but this is the 
cheapest sushi we’ve ever had and we’ve   had a few here in Japan it looks really good 
they also have this system here that No I do not recommend you use unless you speak 
Japanese Alex no no it’s not oh okay oh right on time and of course it’s based on the 
conve super super fast it looks good yeah and almost every dish is 110 with tax except for 
some more special ones that are 120 150 but usually it’s 150 in bigger cities so this is the 
advantage of getting out of the bigger cities [Music] we arrived at our accommodation for tonight tada yep it’s only a parking spot but it’s not a 
regular parking spot it’s a roadside station or as it’s called here in Japan Nichi Noki which 
is a governmental parking spot designated for rest so its purpose is not exactly for sleeping during 
the night but you can do it legally so no worries you can do this if you are on a budget or if 
you don’t find any other accommodation it’s an option because they have bathrooms a lot of 
bathrooms over there which are free they have a convenience store for open for 24 hours 
and usually during the day you’ll also find the restaurants or souvenir stores and other 
shop and it is not isolated look for example this one over there just across the street is a 
mall with a market over there is a McDonald’s the sushi place where we’ve just been was 2 minutes 
away by car from us in the meantime while I’m speaking Alex is making the bed everything 
okay almost finished wow okay he’s moving super fast you can see behind me so wow big bed 
and it can be over here as well wow even bigger final touch so we have this here wow but 
this is the longest bed we’ve ever had it’s actually now looking at it I think 
maybe even three short people could fit wow that is great good job Alex yeah so much space 
wow thank you and come to show the the light show okay come here are you ready okay so we 
have this we have this so this and this yes we have this oh and this is disco you can touch you 
see you turn off so you use as much as you want wow so all of them bang bang bang behind wow 
super nice whole new disco here and it looks cozy yeah finally Alex’s favorite part of the 
day the driver gets a drink i have a bar here made my own bar wow so nice yeah and actually 
this drink is very nice it’s very interesting they have so many flavors mhm enjoy it’s time to 
sleep and then Thank you tomorrow is a new day yay good morning from our camper van we slept 
unexpectedly good and we are super well rested ready for a new adventure today we have a 
really nice location in plan only 2 hours and a half from here unfortunately the weather looks 
like this it’s been raining for I think more than four hours this doesn’t ruin our mood but 
we really hope that we will be able to explore but since the weather is how it is we will start 
slow enjoy a breakfast and relax a bit before hitting the road we have here some yaki soba 
noodles banana matcha and coffee some snacks from the convenience store Lawson which is right 
nearby actually this is matcha bread with bean gem usually not my choice but I realized I 
really enjoy eating matcha with red bean [Music] heat heat [Music] if you’re traveling from Lake Biwa 
to Amano Shidate you need to take a short detour and come here on the avenue of Meta 
Sequoia trees it’s absolutely incredible even now when it’s raining but I think at 
any time of the day the year no matter the weather it’s absolutely incredible we 
haven’t seen something like this before [Music] [Applause] [Music] because it’s raining and we are not in a hurry 
to reach our final destination we stopped on the way in Kumagawa this is a city popular 
because uh it is very well preserved and because it was on the mackerel route back 
in the days when they transported seafood especially mackerel from the Sea of Japan to 
Kyoto through this city it should be popular but apparently not today maybe because of 
the weather people decided to not go out we bought an umbrella and we decided this 
will not stop us from exploring and it’s also super peaceful you can say that today 
this city is ours we have it for our own you can look nobody on the streets there’s 
actually someone over there yeah [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] alex discovered an amazing coffee shop here 
in the city there was no one inside we came to have a coffee and what we discovered when we 
arrived oh my god it’s a jazz cafe and they play music from a pickup they roast their own coffee 
and the atmosphere is just fits perfectly with the weather outside it’s raining we can see 
some people passing admire the rain and just enjoy a quiet and peaceful time here we stopped 
here because it was on our way not knowing what to expect but honestly this turned out to be 
such a beautiful place it’s so peaceful and it’s surrounded by so much nature all these 
hills with trees everything is green there’s water all around us so few tourists just 
incredible honestly if you are around it definitely deserves a visit the coffee shop was 
incredible the coffee was delicious the prices were super affordable even though the location 
was premium what it offered as an experience it was a coffee 600 yen what can you say 
everything is absolutely amazing we feel like this could be a movie scene movie set movie set yeah 
exactly so yeah we love it and now we are super lucky because it stopped raining the sky starts to 
clear up and we’re ready for our next destination heat heat [Music] after a long but beautiful ride we are finally at 
Amano Hashidate i hope I pronounced it correctly this name Oh my god sorry for the wind it’s a 
lot of wind this name actually means the bridge to heaven or the bridge in heaven because when 
looked from above from the top of the mountain here nearby uh with your head between your legs 
this looks like a desend bar that we’re walking right now actually looks like it is in the sky 
in the sky so if you stay like this and you walk like like this yes exactly very competition 
i don’t think we will be able to do it yeah I don’t know how they came up with that maybe 
there was a kid playing and yeah anyway so I’m not sure if we will be able to do that because 
I heard that it’s a cable taking you up on the mountain and it might be closed but yeah but we 
are enjoying this walk on the sand bar with all of these pines around us and it’s actually 
super windy because over there because it’s if you will look on the map it’s actually as I 
said the sand bar on the sea so we have water there water there and there’s a lot of wind 
wind here everything is calm like in life you know not sure if this happens every day maybe 
it’s maybe I don’t know it’s more windy today   super windy it seems people are mostly leaving 
and we are the only ones going but it’s okay at least we made it here and we needed a little walk 
because we spent so much time in the car it’s not too cold though i mean no with all this wind and 
it’s super beautiful the view on the right side heat heat [Music] [Applause] 
[Music] [Applause] [Music] wow it’s so beautiful here and there’s no 
wind and I’m really surprised to see that apart from two more people we are 
the only ones here it’s incredible and actually uh when I’m filming this video is 
the golden week here in Japan which is a very popular time for traveling because it’s holiday 
and I read that it would be super crowded but I don’t know where are all the people look 
how beautiful it is and so peaceful yeah and the water look is super I want to take 
a bath i have my swimwear in the camper van not so cold [Music] it seems that we made it right on time and 
we can still go up where oh my god okay but we’re lost and we might be able to see the view 
from above but we have only 45 minutes [Music] wow we were so lucky because after walking 
all the way on the sandbar I don’t know exactly how long I think 30 40 minutes we 
made it right on time for almost the last uh lift up we took the chair and we are up here 
to see the view and uh Alex you can do the you can watch between your legs okay so you’re 
not ready for this but this is the view wow wow so beautiful so I think uh from May or from 
April to November you can go up until 6:00 p.m but maybe during other months it’s even earlier so now 
it’s 5:30 and we were on time and by 6:00 we need to go down but I think this is the most beautiful 
moment of the day because uh the light is not too strong and it’s sunset time alex is trying to 
see whether or not it looks like a bridge in the sky it looks Yeah yeah okay he confirms i 
will try you need to have a little imagination okay so try to imagine that half 
is earth and half is sky oh yes you can see it’s true i can’t believe we walked 
all the way because for us it seemed to pretty easy i mean it was not a difficult effort but 
now looking at it and thinking that we need to go back because we parked our car on the other 
way maybe there’s like a public transportation that can take you there but we will walk 
again good workout and by the way it seems that uh this is the perfect time to come here 
because there’s no one i mean even us when we looked online it showed that it will close at 
5 but turns out it closes at 6 so maybe all the people think it closes at 5 and they don’t 
come but we showed up we decided if we went all the way from that side to this one we should 
at least try and here we are and it’s amazing it’s no one here and I told you that when I 
researched it said that it will be crowded i even had doubts if we should come here or not 
because of so many tourists but it’s no one [Music] [Laughter] [Music] Good morning guys last night we were so tired 
we actually went out and had some dinner but we didn’t film much because we just wanted to sleep 
it was an amazing day unfortunately today is the last day of our road trip later in the afternoon 
we will go back to Osaka to return the van it’s been amazing but we still have something left to 
see and discover it’s going to be a fisherman’s village over water it’s called Infunaya so uh 
stay tuned for it but in the meantime I wanted to show you where we parked our car last night it’s 
another Ninoi as I told you these are governmental made parkings for longtime travelers rest stops 
and it’s so full of camper vents and small cars in which people sleep in and it was even more 
crowded last night some people have already left but I’ll turn the camera around so you can 
see how many camper vans on this side there are bigger camper vans i think the parking lots 
are a bit larger look at that and on this side there are smaller cars but you will be surprised 
that a lot of people sleep in those as well like those ones and what is super interesting for 
us is that there are no international tourists there are local tourists a lot of them so for 
us this makes a super authentic experience and also realize how common is this camper van thing 
it’s super immersive super authentic we love it but we encourage you if you’re an international 
tourist watching this to travel this way because it’s super convenient and by the way I think I 
told you before but this Minoi usually come of course all the time with toilets and some even 
have like 10 20 toilets um and they have stores restaurants this one in the parking lot even 
has like a big mall so it’s super convenient and if you want to shower because not all 
camper vents are equipped with showers you can do it in public beds or on sense for a 
small amount of money like 700 800 yen [Music] we made it to inn and we are at the parking 
lot which is free again it’s called Mi Noaki on Google Maps and this parking lot is super special 
because it has the most beautiful view over Faya village that we will soon go visit so we want to 
see how people live there and how are the streets how is life over there we’re going to visit 
the village but the view is incredible [Music] [Music] right behind me is the famous Fonaya village 
it looks absolutely amazing the water is so clear and we can see how people still 
live in the houses on the first floor they have their boats parked and I guess 
that is the main mean of transportation and   probably the way they fish maybe they 
go with the boat and they live on the second floor so beautiful and also another 
attraction here if you’re a tourist you can go on a cruise with the boat and I heard 
you can also feed some birds ah [Music] [Music] here in Faya is also Saki Brewery 
behind me unfortunately they do not offer tourists i don’t know if they did 
in the past or if they will do it would   have been a very good idea and uh we were 
really interested in that anyway the shop is still open you can buy sake and they are 
making it here and the history behind this brewery is that it had the first female 
expert in sake brewing in Japan [Music] [Music] unfortunately it’s time to return the 
van we have to say goodbye it was such an incredible adventure here in Japan and 
uh we promised Ourselves we will do it again we will return and we will rent a camper van 
for a longer period of time because it’s just a great way to discover this incredible country 
so we rented our camper van from Samurai Campers they have all kinds of camper vans smaller and 
bigger and they have different locations not only in Osaka but they have locations in Tokyo 
and you can uh search on their website i will leave it in the description below in case you 
want to rent with them and you will see all the locations all the camper vans they have super 
affordable costs and the communication is great you can even contact them on their social 
media on Instagram and they will be happy   to answer thank you so much for watching this 
episode i hope you enjoyed it in case you did don’t forget to leave a like and subscribe to see 
other adventures from Japan thank you bye [Music]

In this episode, we’re leaving the hustle of Osaka behind and hitting the road for a 3-day campervan trip through Kyoto Prefecture.

We’ll explore charming, lesser-known towns, and soak in some of the most beautiful places we’ve seen from the iconic Shirahige Shrine rising from the water, to the breathtaking Amanohashidate sandbar, and the waterfront village of Ine.

We’re also sharing our experience of traveling Japan by campervan — where to park, how to find places to sleep, and what to expect on the road.

Welcome to this new episode – VAN LIFE IN JAPAN: Exploring Hidden KYOTO in 3 Days

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