TOKYO TRAVEL GUIDE: Everything to Know Before You Go

TOKYO TRAVEL GUIDE: Everything to Know Before You Go

Everything you need to know to visit Tokyo, one of my favorite cities in the world. In this video, I’m going to tell you how to get in, how to get around, what to see, what to do, what to eat, and even where to get money, the best times of the year to go. Every frequently asked questions you’ve got about this city, I’ve packed in this one guide. And by the way, I made a few versions of this over the years, and some information is timeless. The things that didn’t change, I didn’t re-record those clips. And so, if I look instantly younger in some clips, that is why. All right, let’s go. And the first thing to know is just some information about Tokyo. Tokyo is the capital of Japan and it literally translates to east capital and it’s also the world’s most populated metropolis. Tokyo feels like high-tech meets old school at the same time. You’ll find ancient Shinto shrines next to gigantic skyscrapers. And right now I’m actually in Toronto Hills in the hotel Toronto Hills. And right next to these gigantic skyscrapers, there are indeed shrines right down below. It feels something like out of a science fiction movie, particularly if you’re in the neighborhoods like Shabuya with the huge lightup signs. In addition to these skyscrapers, you’ll find robots, sumo wrestling, and the world’s busiest train stations all on this one city. A truly amazing place. The population of Tokyo is 14 million. More than 11% of Japan’s population live in Tokyo. The greater Tokyo area has a population of 35 million and about 14 million people visit Tokyo annually. Now, while certain areas of Tokyo can certainly feel really crowded and maybe even overcrowded, there’s certainly a whole thing going online about is Tokyo too overcrowded, Japan’s overcrowding problem, let me tell you, the biggest popular sites, they are crowded cuz they’re really popular. But what I love about coming to Tokyo, there’s a lot of green space, there’s a lot of parks, there’s a lot of places that you can get away from the hustle and bustle. I’m going to share some of those with you when we get to the things to do section. And the second thing to know is some information to help you get oriented to Tokyo. And by the way, every scene in this video I’m going to be doing in a different part of Tokyo, so you get to see it as we go. This is the Edeto Tokyo Open Air Architectural Museum that I’ll talk more about when we get in the things to know section. Tokyo is one of Japan’s 47 prefectures and is composed of 23 wards, 26 cities, five towns, and eight villages. It’s technically not a city, but a metropolitan prefecture. When most people think of visiting Tokyo, they are thinking of visiting those 23 wards. Central Tokyo, Imperial, and upscale. This zone is centered around the Imperial Palace, Tokyo Station, Marininoci, Rapongi, and Ginsa. It serves as the nation’s business and financial corps. Home to the Imperial Palace, high-end department stores, luxury boutiques, embassies, and a high concentration of fine dining establishments. The vibe here is sophisticated, orderly, and prestigious. The business core of the city with a daytime population more than seven times higher than their nighttime population. Near Ginsa is also Tokyo’s best neighborhood for seafood, which was home to Tokyo’s central seafood market that has now moved out to Toyosu, one of the many artificial islands that has been built in Tokyo Bay, which is also home to the newer Tokyo attractions like Team Lab Planets. Oda nearby is also another fun artificial island with fun attractions. And yes, it’s even got a replica of the Statue of Liberty. Now, moving on, Western Tokyo is home to some of the modern hubs, particularly Shinjuku, Shabuya, and Harajuku. This represents the modern dynamic face of Tokyo characterized by towering skyscrapers, vibrant night life, massive electronic billboards, and the epicenter of youth, fashion, and culture. This is the Tokyo of popular imagination, full of energy, and constant change. Heading over to northeastern Tokyo, this is the traditional heart of the city. This includes neighborhoods like Asaka, Ueno, and it’s often referred to as the low city, the historical downtown of old Edeto. Here, the atmosphere is marketkedly different, defined by ancient temples, sprawling parks, traditional markets, and major national museums. A visit to this side of the city offers a connection to Tokyo’s rich history. You’ll find Tokyo Disney Resort further off to the east in Chiba Prefecture, but only a 15-minute train ride from Tokyo Station. We’ll talk more about Tokyo Disney when we get to the things to do section of this video. Now, most visitors will find it helpful to think of these major areas on a circle. Why a circle? Well, because Tokyo’s most famous train line, the Yamanote Loop Line, does essentially that. It runs in a big circle connecting these districts. Train and subway transportation is such a part of the Tokyo fabric that most people refer to neighborhoods that usually coincide with the name of a train station. Now, if you like to get yourself oriented by going up high, there are four great place to do that and look down on the city below. The first is the Tokyo Skytree. It’s the tallest tower in the world and the third tallest structure in all of the world. Great views of Tokyo from up there. It is indoors. Good for all weather. My favorite is Shabuya Sky. It’s an open air observatory above the Shabuya Scramble Crossing. It’s Tokyo’s most famous intersection where thousands of people cross every few minutes. But I like this one the best because you can go outside on the rooftop. Uh in Shinjuku, you can go up to a free observatory on the Tokyo Metropolitan Government offices. And finally, there’s a replica of the Eiffel Tower known as the Tokyo Tower, but I consider that one to be more of a tourist trap. The third thing to know is about getting into Tokyo and there are two major airports to get into Tokyo and they are not created equally. By the way, I’m shooting this scene right now at Shabuya Scramble Crossing. This is the busiest pedestrian intersection as far as I know in the world. Thousands of people cross every few minutes. And so if you hear some whistles in the background, those are police telling people to get out of the intersection because the the cars are going to come by. All right, so these two different airports, Haneda is definitely my favorite option for coming into Tokyo because it’s overwhelmingly the closer airport, particularly if you’re staying in the southern part of Tokyo. You can get a taxi ride from Haneda to the center of the city that takes about 30 minutes and costs about $50 US. Now, Haneda used to be primarily a domestic airport for just going around Japan, but in recent years, they’ve been expanding a lot of international flights there. And so, they actually have a lot of flights from LAX into Haneda, San Francisco into Haneda. And so when I fly into Tokyo, I like to fly into Haneda. The exception on this trip, we actually flew into Narita that we’re going to talk about in just a moment. And we flew out of Haneda. Why? Well, because we were going to the north of Japan. And so Narita being north is a bit more convenient if you’re heading to point north. So Narita is the big international airport in Tokyo. It’s actually outside of Tokyo. It’s 70 to 75 kilometers east of Tokyo in the neighboring Chiba Prefecture. If you’re going to get a taxi from Narita into Tokyo Center, it’s going to cost you a fortune, like $1500 to $200. So, most people take the Narita Express or the Kes Skyliner. Uh travel times range from 40 to 90 minutes on those depending upon where you’re going, but that’s definitely the best way to get in the city or to take the friendly airport limousine bus. They’re these big orange buses that serve a bunch of hotels in the city center. A really handy thing to do at the airports is to ship your luggage if you’ve got a lot of luggage and particularly if you’ve got a long stay. Uh these counters, the Yamamoto Transport and Jal ABC, they both do luggage deliveries to hotels. And what we did is we delivered one suitcase here that we want 6 days from now to a hotel in Tokyo cuz we’re going to be going up to Sendai. What was the price for one suitcase? $2,750 yen. About $20 that they hold for 6 days. and deliver pretty good. Yes. Some other things you might want to do while you’re at the airport, pick up some money. There’s plenty of ATMs about. We’ll talk more about which are the best ones to use when we talk about money in the money section. You might also want to pick up a pocket Wi-Fi. I’ve tend to use eims when I come to Japan. They’re a great way to come in. I’ve been using SIM Local. If you want to use the same eSIM that I use, I’ll put a link in the description to that and a coupon code to get 10% off. Some other things you might want to do at the airport, you might want to pick up a pocket Wi-Fi. If you’re not using an eSIM or a traditional SIM card or global roaming, you might want to pick up one of these wireless routers that your whole party can use. It’s best to reserve them online and then you’ll find the pickup counters at the airport. Also, if you’re renting a car, pretty easy to pick them up at the airport. They’re generally not in the terminal. You generally have to take a shuttle to them. My favorite rental car company if you’re doing that is Toyota Rental Car. But if you want to know more information about actually driving in Japan, I have a whole video on that subject. You can check the link to it in the description below. If you’ve got kiddos with you in the airport and you didn’t bring your stroller, take a look for airport strollers here at Haneda Airport. They’ve got this cool airport stroller that the Curious Princess left. She’s 5 years old and so this is probably her last year that she’s going to be able to fit into this thing. Tokyo also has a lot of cruises that arrive here. If you’re arriving by cruise, then you’ll be arriving into the cruise ship terminal into Oda. And the fourth thing to know is about getting around Tokyo. And the best way to get around Tokyo is definitely by the trains and the subway. And so we’re going to talk about that first. Yeah, looking at the maps for the Tokyo trains can be quite intimidating. There’s 62 electric train lines and more than 900 stations. But it doesn’t have to be. If you’re a tourist and you’re here for the first time, think of the city on the JR Yamanote loop line. It’s a circular line that goes around Tokyo. You can ride that most anywhere that you need to go as a tourist. And it makes it easy cuz you’re just going one line around. Well, hey, here’s our stop. So, I’m going to continue in a little bit. Some other options for getting around. There’s lots of buses that run around Tokyo. I don’t really recommend them for firsttime tourists just cuz they’re a little confusing and it adds a bit more complexity. Taxis, you can take taxis. The taxis in Tokyo are probably some of the nicest you’ll take anywhere in the world. They are probably also some of the most expensive. So, don’t plan on taking taxis for long distances. Uber now operates in Tokyo, but you will find Uber to be just as expensive or perhaps even more expensive than taxis. Oh, and to get a taxi, we use the Taxi Go Japan app. It’s like the official taxi app Japan. Taxi showed up in 2 minutes. An amazing, wonderful ride as always in Japan in the taxi. Google Maps has a great map to help you navigate uh destinations in the subway. If you’re buying Shin Kansen tickets, you can now buy them from your smartphone on this app called Smart X. So, if you buy tickets online, you can pick them up at one of these reserved seat vending machines. You will get a thing that has a QR code on it that you can pick up at the machine. You find this machine, you scan the QR code, and then it says, “Go ahead and issue your tickets.” And then they print out right down there, note, there’s a few tickets for the Shinkansen, so make sure you pick up the whole stack of them to come out. So, one of the new things about getting around Tokyo, updated for this guide in this edition, is that many trains and subways are actually taking tapin credit cards to get in in addition to just Sua or IC cards. Now, not every train line is doing it and not every wicket at every train. In particular, the JR trains still are really sticking on to Sua and the IC cards they have. But a lot of the private lines, if you go through the ticket gates and you see one that has kind of like these logos on it, then you don’t need to sweep a card. You can actually just tap in with your Visa or Master Card or your Apple Pay or your Google Wallet to ride. Tap in and then of course make sure you tap out so you’re charged the correct fair bit. But whatever you do, don’t even think about driving in Tokyo. Uh rental cars are expensive, parking’s expensive. Actually, there’s very little parking. So don’t drive. Just just don’t do it. And when you’re navigating the city, it’s useful to have your destination printed out, not just in English, but also in Japanese, so that you can show it to somebody or you can show it to a taxi driver and help them understand because not everybody in Tokyo uh can really understand English all that well. We’ll talk more about that in language, but if you show them your destination in Japanese, then they can help you get there. And if you don’t know Japanese, your hotel can help you write it in Japanese or give you a name card, say that has a name of the hotel on a card, so you can always show that to a taxi to get back to your hotel. The fifth thing to know is when to go. We’ll start with the summer. The summertime in Tokyo is hot and humid. Daytime highs average around 80° F, 26° C. It’s really a steamy city. Uh if you were to come in spring or fall, those are my favorite seasons to come. Daytime highs are around 60° Fahrenheit. If you come in spring, uh, March and April, that’s when the cherry blossoms are blooming. That’s probably considered to be the most beautiful season in Tokyo. Though, it’s also the most expensive season because everybody else wants to come here for the cherry blossoms. If you come here during the fall, you can see the leaves change color. If you come in the winter, it’s cold. Daytime highs will be around 40° F. It does not snow very much in Tokyo. We might get a light dusting once a year, but the snow doesn’t really accumulate all that much. But it can be quite windy. So the 40° Fahrenheit can actually seem a lot colder than you might think cuz it gets this really cold wind off the bay. The other thing to note related to rain, it can rain a lot in Tokyo. And as the temperature goes up, so does the rain. So summer’s going to be hot, but it’s going to have the most rain. Winter’s going to be the coldest. It’ll have the least amount of rain, which might actually be better for touristing around. Winter has the cheapest hotel rates. But the one exception to this is that October is typhoon season. So if you do come in fall around October, really do bring an umbrella and be prepared. Actually bring an umbrella all year round. Uh so my favorite season is the fall and just to hope it doesn’t come during typhoon time. And now that all being said, we’re here in February right now and it’s actually kind of warm. The temperatures in February here 2020 are about 65° F. And by the way, if you know, I said it’ll be less busy in February. Th this is less busy in February. So you can imagine in the summertime, it’s insane. And the sixth thing to know is about the language in Tokyo. And it’s Japanese, of course, but it’s actually not just that simple. There’s actually different dialects of Japanese. So you might have been taught the traditional Tokyo one, but there’s actually different dialects around the country. You go to Osaka, and they speak a little bit differently down there. Now, you’re probably wondering, Chris, do I need to know Japanese? Can I get by if I only speak English? I only speak English. I don’t really speak much Japanese. I speak a little bit of Japanese. I know some phrases. I can say like Mizu kudisai, please give me water. Or beeru kudisai, please give me beer. So yes, it’s useful in any country you go to, including Japan to learn a few phrases so that you can say Ohio, good morning. Or you can say, arato, thank you very much. But you definitely do not have to be fluent in Japanese to come to Japan. In the big cities, you will find most of the young people speak English. Uh they’ve all been taught English in schools, but um although while they understand it, they may not be able to speak it very well. Why? They don’t get a lot of chances to practice speaking it. You’ll find the older generations will know a few phrases. They’ll know things like um check this one to go for here. Like two-word phrases are phrases that they know you sit in a taxi. You know, they’ll know address. Do you have an address? They’ll know seat belt please, but they won’t be able to carry on a long conversation with you. In the subways, in the big cities, you will find them all to be signed in English and also announced in English. And you’ll find many of the train staff will have a little badge that says like English or they’ll have like a flag on it to show you that they speak English. You’ll also find a lot of staff at information centers where they’ll have signs to say like English available. And in a place like Tokyo, you’ll find tons of English restaurants at menus. If you don’t see one, you can always ask the staff, “Do you have an English menu?” And worst comes to worse, if you’re in a restaurant and you can’t speak Japanese and they don’t have an English menu, just use the point and order method. They have all that plastic food that’s out in front, you can take a picture of it out in front and then bring it into the restaurant and say, “This one, this one.” Or at the menu, if the menu has pictures, same thing. You can just say this one and this one. I do that quite a bit. Oh, by the way, if you’re wondering where I am right now, I am definitely in one of the big metropolitan pockets. I am at the rooftop garden of Ginsa 6. This is one of Tokyo’s major department stores, and many of the department stores across Japan have these things, rooftop gardens. They’re free to come in, open to the public, have lunch, relax, chill out, uh, and enjoy the view. Great views of here. You can see down the main Ginsa Street, and you can see like the multi-story Unilo flagship. It’s just a cool perspective to come up to these rooftop areas. And it’s neat how they maintain them just for public use. I mean, I’m sure they really want you to do some shopping while you’re here, which I just may. Let me go see what Ginsa 6 has to offer. Oh, and one more thing that’s like kind of funny about Japanese that you should know when you come here is they definitely use a lot of lone word from English. They take the English word and they just like modify it ever so slightly. So, for example, if you were ordering a hamburger in Japan, haga. If you are getting a coffee in Japan, kohhi. So the Japanese words for some things legitimately sound like words you already know. So if you don’t know the Japanese, just try the English because chances are it might actually be close to the Japanese. Before you come to Tokyo, you should know that Japan uses Japanese yen. In recent years, the exchange rate has ranged between about 140 to 160 yen to$1 US. Compared to other big cities like London, Paris, or New York, food, transportation, and accommodations are surprisingly more affordable in Tokyo thanks to the recent weakness of the Japanese yen. Now, you’re certainly definitely going to still find expensive things like this premium sushi bowl for $90 and this cantaloupe for $200, but overall everyday prices are relatively quite reasonable. Now, when it comes to accommodations, if you book early and avoid the busy times like Cherry Blossom, Golden Week, and New Year’s, you can often find small but clean and conveniently located hotels ranging from about $1 to $200 for a night that’s suitable for one or two people. If you’ve got a family of three or four, you know, add another $50 to $100 at night so that you can get into a bigger room. Now, remember to book early to get the best prices. And if you do need bigger family rooms, because the cheapest rooms are quite small, you’ll want to book those early too because there’s a lot less of the bigger rooms. Now, while Tokyo is definitely having more and more businesses that are using credit cards or accepting credit cards, what many don’t do is accept tap credit cards or accept Apple Pay and Google Pay. Many terminals you will see signs that say no Tap, no Luba Pay, no Apple Pay. So, make sure to bring your physical credit cards with you when you come. And yes, like I guess much like most of much of the world after co there are also many of places that have moved to digital payments only. So you will need cash and credit cards to or debit cards maybe one of the two to be able to enjoy Tokyo the most. Definitely the best place to get yen in Japan is from a 711 ATM. It accepts most international cards. You’ll find them nearly every 7ele1. Uh it has the best exchange rate, the lowest fees. You can see it takes uh like what 1% or something like that. You exchange 20,000 yen. So, we’ll go ahead and do that. This is out of my Charles Schwab account, which is an account that has no foreign transaction fees, which is why I use this. So, if you’re in the USA, Charles Schwab debit, best credit card or best debit card, best bank account. Now, this is something you’ll see a lot in Japan. And you’ll see it on ATMs and you’ll see it at point of sale terminals where they’ll offer you this currency conversion fee where they’ll convert it to your home currency with a 4% markup. You don’t want that. You generally want to take it in the local currency. So if you see this on credit card readers, local currency, the 4% markup of always going to be more than what your bank or credit card company charges you. All right, we’ll take card. We’ll take the receipt. And now we are we end up right there. A suica card, the rechargeable IC card that you can use to ride trains and buses in Japan, can often be used at many other places like restaurants, convenience stores, and vending machines. Pro tip, if you have an iPhone, make sure to add a card to your Apple wallet before your trip. This way, you don’t actually have to buy a physical one. You can add a digital one and you can recharge it with your credit card on your iPhone and avoid the line in Tokyo counting cash in front of everyone who’s about to miss the last bullet train home because of you. Now, if you’re an Android user, tough luck. Sua is not supported on overseas Android phones unless you have a local Japanese model. So, if you’re an Android user, make sure to pick up the physical card. You can buy them at pretty much any major train station or at the airport. It is definitely well worth it. You don’t want to be buying single tickets. Oh, and if you see at some maybe subway stations, they don’t sell, but they sell this thing called Pasmo. It’s also equivalent to the sua card. Like all the IC cards that are used for transit in Japan are compatible with all the other ones. It’s a whole all the different names as a subject for a different video, but get yourself an IC card so that you can ride the train and subway without having to buy individual tickets. And thank me later. And the last note about money, there is no tipping in Tokyo. No tipping a restaurant, no tipping the taxi driver, no tipping the hotel staff. They have a no tipping culture in Japan actually can be considered rude or they might not know what to do with this. So if you were at a restaurant and you left some change there, the staff might be running after you after you left to give you your money back because they’d be like, “What? What is this extra money you left here?” The eighth thing to know before you go to Tokyo is about food. And sure, there is a lot of seafood in Tokyo, which is what I’ve got in front of me. And we have some seafood bowls right here. But there is so much more than seafood. Tokyo has an amazing amount of restaurants in the city. 160,000 restaurants in Tokyo. Compare that to New York City. New York City has only 30,000 restaurants. So, there’s a lot of choice here. And by the way, you should know there’s a lot more choice than just sushi. One of my favorites is Katsu in particular. But the restaurants here, why are they so good? And they are really good. It’s because they have really good ingredients, really great precision in making them, often generations of experience. Many of the restaurants are passed down for generations and they often serve just one thing and really well. This restaurant in particular serves katsu. And I will point out and just katu like that’s the menu. And I’ll point out that the restaurants can be pretty small. Sushi restaurants might only have eight seats. This restaurant, if you take a look down there, only has seven tables. So, something else I want to point out related to eating in Tokyo. If there’s a restaurant you want to eat in that’s pretty popular, and this one is too come at off hours. My recommendation is try the popular restaurants between 2:30 and 4:30. So, that’s kind of a weird middle time of day, but if you wake up early, have a early lunch, then you can kind of fit this in and have a snack for dinner. Otherwise, at popular restaurants in Tokyo, cuz it’s such a big city, if you get there at 5:00, there might already be a line. If you get there the end of lunch hour, they might have already capped the line. So, try to eat the popular places in off hours. But definitely make sure you do look at their closing times because many restaurants in Tokyo close between lunch and dinner. So, they might close between 2:30 and 5. A great option for finding restaurants that are open all day is department stores. There will typically be one floor on the department store that’s just dedicated to restaurants. I don’t mean the food court, I mean the restaurants. It’s usually on the top floor. This particular katu restaurant we’re eating at is on the 11th floor of the Mitsukoshi department store in Ginsa. Ginsa has a lot of department stores, so a lot of restaurants that are open midday. You should also know that portion sizes are really small for food and drinks. We just stopped here at this train station and wanted to get a small strawberry juice. Do you see how small this cup is? This is my hand. This is the cup. This was 300 yen. It’s really good, though. But just know when you order a small drink, it’s going to be small. If you’re planning on dining at any of Tokyo’s really high-end restaurants, you should make reservations. Some of Tokyo’s high-end restaurants take reservations months ahead. And some of them are invite only or you have to know somebody. Like the restaurant made famous from the Jirro documentary, the sushi restaurant. It’s actually a private restaurant now and you have to know somebody who knows somebody to get a reservation. So my tip to you is if you’re booking a nice hotel in Tokyo and you want to book a nice restaurant, call the hotel’s concierge where you’re staying at. Ask them to try and make a reservation for you at that restaurant. ideally 2 or 3 months ahead of your trip to Tokyo. Also, something new I’ve noticed is that um a tendency towards online reservation platforms. There’s some restaurants we want to eat at that we needed to make a reservation online and we needed to put in a phone number. So, pro tip for putting in your phone number. If it won’t take your phone number outside of Japan, try the phone number of the hotel that you’re staying at. That might work out for you. We also use the AMX uh cuz we have an AMX Platinum card, AMX Concierge to help us make a reservation at a restaurant that we had a hard time making online. And then when you show up at the restaurant for your reservation, make sure you’re there on time. If your reservations at 6:00 p.m., you better be there precisely at 6:00 p.m. If you roll in at 6:15, chances are they might have thought you’re not coming at all, gave your table to someone else. Oh, and also another thing about restaurants, a lot more going to tablets that you order just off on the side that you don’t even interact with a waiter. and QR codes for menus. So, it really helps to have you have data on your phone so you can actually scan that QR code. And so, when you’re done eating, you need to know how to pay. Most restaurants that are sit down restaurants in Tokyo will bring you a bill as soon as you’ve gotten your food at your table. They’ll typically place it on the side of your table or maybe even underneath. The other thing sometimes they do will be like this. At this beef restaurant, they give you this that says, “Thank you for coming. Please bring this check to the cashier when you leave.” And so you typically don’t pay at your table. You’ll pay at a cashier actually right behind me when we leave. If we didn’t have this, then we would bring the check or the bill up there to pay. And just because they bring you the check right away, that doesn’t mean you have to leave right away. Don’t feel rushed. If there is a time limit on tables, they’ll typically tell you that when you sit down. For some of the most interesting dining experiences in Tokyo and most atmospheric dine underneath the train tracks, we are here right near the Yako station. And this is a whole like fish market, drinking area, hence the spinning fish. This is very lively at night. And the trains roll over about every minute in these restaurants. You hear a kco, kung, kco. It’s just one of those really cool experiences. And you’ll find them not just here in Tokyo, but all over. Maybe not right underneath the train tracks, but next to the train tracks. So look by the train tracks for interesting restaurants. Number nine is drinking. The legal drinking age in Tokyo is 20 years old. And actually, beer and alcohol is relatively inexpensive in Tokyo, particularly if you buy your beer and alcohol at vending machines and convenience stores. If you do buy alcohol at a convenience store, they are required to confirm you’re over 20. The way they often do that is by having a little button on a touchcreen that says, “Are you over 20?” And you push the button that says yes. If you’re drinking at some of Tokyo’s traditional isizakayas, these drinking and food establishments, many times they have a time limit where you can only be there at a table for 60 or 90 minutes. And just be aware of any unlimited drink specials. When they have drink specials, it’s usually just for a certain amount of time. So, it might be 4,000 yen all you can drink for 30 minutes. And then the next drink that you order at minute 31 might cost you 10,000 yen. you know, the equivalent of $100 for that drink at 31 minutes. So, be aware of all you can drink. You should know about Japanese vending machines in Tokyo. They are amazing. I’m thirsty. Let’s get a drink. And I’m going to show you how this works. So, uh there’s a selection of beverages in here. Prices are generally in digital numbers because they change. They’re all in yen. Uh and it’ll take coins. It’ll take,000 yen bills, which is about the equivalent of $10, and give you change back. But if you want to avoid having all this change in your pocket, you can actually pay with a Suica card that we talked about earlier. And so how this works is you take the card and you tap it right here. And then you go ahead and pick what drink you want. We’re going to take that one and tap the card again. And now it deducted my amount. And I got my drink. So Card gateway to Japanese vending machines. You’re going to find a Japanese vending machine in Tokyo nearly every 50 ft that you walk around. There are almost more vending machines, I think, than there are people in Tokyo. Okay, that’s not true. I think there’s one vending machine per 25 people was the actual statistic. Japan has something like five or 6 million vending machines for 130 million people. That’s a lot. And in addition to this, there’s a lot of unique vending machines, and there’s even like really high techch vending machines. Take a look at this one. This one you don’t see the drinks on it, you actually see the drinks on a screen. And this vending machine, in addition to having cold drinks in blue, you’ll see it also has hot drinks in red. So if you want a hot drink, then you can get that there. It says my IC card is not accepted cuz I I haven’t I haven’t clicked it yet. But great place to get your drinks. You don’t need to carry around tons of water from the hotel cuz you can get a drink pretty much anytime you want at walking around Tokyo. The 11th thing to know before you go to Tokyo is about where to stay. And the first thing you should know is Tokyo has a lot of different hotel rooms, a lot of different styles of hotels, over a 100,000 hotel rooms, but it can get really busy. So, I would encourage you to absolutely book your hotels early. Consider at least 3 months out if you’re coming at popular seasons. She’s okay. Uh, and 6 months out if you’re coming at like cherry blossoms or a busy holiday time. Oh, by the way, for context, that note of about 100,000 hotel rooms, that’s about the same number of hotel rooms as a city like Los Angeles, except a city like Tokyo is 10 times the size in population. The princess, she really likes hotels in Tokyo because there’s so many unique hotels. Right now, we’re staying at the Mimaru Ueno East Hotel. This is a Japanese style apartment hotel. What’s the difference between a Japanese room and a western room? Well, most hotels you’re going to find in Tokyo are actually western style rooms, which means they look just like a Marriott or a Hyatt or a Hilton, but a Japanese style room, it’s going to have low beds perhaps like we have in the back, tatami mats, and typically futons that you can lay out to make the beds. Now, this room is kind of a Japanese western style room in that there are two beds that are just here all the time, though they’re um they’re low beds. And uh in the closet over here, there are two futons you can pull out. So up to four people can sleep in this room. And then being Japanese style, it has a separate sleeping area and living area. You set up the futons, you put the table right here. So right now we’ve got the futons away and the table here. If you really want the traditional Japanese experience, definitely consider booking a Japanese style room. For the best value, avoid the western chains, Marriott, Hilton, Hayyatt. They’re really overpriced in Tokyo. you’ll probably be paying twice the price compared to the typical Japanese counterparts for honestly similar type amenities. Yes, we do stay at the Merits Hilton and Heights and you’ll find a lot of reviews on them, but we’re often booking them on points when we come here. But do beware, Japanese hotel rooms are small. Um they’re like the smallest hotel rooms I’ve stayed at in the world in Tokyo. I mean, maybe they rival some of the rooms in Paris. And the closer you get to desirable neighborhoods, the smaller the hotel rooms get. The best hotels, the best locations are obviously going to be closest to the train station. And if you’re looking to save some money, consider some of the Japanese business chains. Toyoko Inn is an example. Now, to have a room size something similar to an American size room, when I’m booking rooms, I’ll usually look for something that’s 25 square meters or above. Realize that not all room types are created equal. Many Japanese hotels have tons of different room types, so maybe don’t book the cheapest one if you actually want a little bit of space to spread out. When I say Japanese hotel rooms can be small, I mean like the smallest rooms, they won’t even have places for you to open up your luggage in the room. Like you’ll we’ve stayed at some hotels that you need to open up your luggage on the bed because there’s literally no space. What do you think about hotel rooms in Tokyo, Princess? Now, definitely if you’re looking to have more than two people in your room, you’ll be in a different tier category. The base occupancy for most Japanese hotel rooms is two. And they often do charge for extra people. So, if you have extra people, make sure you put it in there when you make your reservation so you get the right price and you get the right tier. Particularly if you’re staying at Olsen or Hotring Hotels. Not that there’s actually that many of them at Tokyo, but those are ones that notoriously charge per person. And like if you don’t put in the third person and you can think you can sneak them in, uh, like cuz you saw a picture that had like three beds in the room, there won’t be. They’ll they’ll have hidden it. They’ll have covered it up. They won’t put the bedding in. So, make sure you put the right number of people on the room reservation. Now, Tokyo itself is really huge. So, you’re going to want to stay near a transit hub. There’s not really one best neighborhood to stay at in Tokyo because it’s so big. And you might, like we’re doing on this trip, you might actually want to consider breaking up your trip at multiple hotels. We’re actually staying at three different hotels on this week that we’re spending in Tokyo. So, we’re closer to the things that we want to do. For example, we’re going to Tokyo Disney. So, we’re going to spend a night over at Tokyo Disney. Hey, I have something to say. What do you have to say? Elsie Girl is going to stay at three hotels. And me and Luction, we are going to go to the Disney hotel. Yeah, that’s right. We’re actually splitting up for that night as I’m taking the Curious Princess to Disneyland. We’re not splitting up from our whole relationship. Just for that night, we go to Disneyland so OC girl can enjoy all the boring museums while we enjoy the rides. Isn’t that right? Now, some of my favorite neighborhoods to stay in that are really close to major train stations are Shinjuku, Tokyo Station, around Tokyo Skytree, or Askusa, Shibuya, Ginsza, Rapongi, or anywhere on the JR Yamanote line. Now, the hotels that are on the Yamanote line, you’ll find they’re probably more expensive, the ones that are on those neighborhoods that I just talked through, but if you’re like one stop away from Shinjuku, probably be cheaper, but still reasonably convenient. Now, if you say, “Chris, if you only had one hotel for me to recommend, what would it be? We really like the Hotel Century Southern Tower in Shinjuku. That was great when it was OC girl and I, but now that we’ve got the Curious Princess and we need bigger room, we’ve had to get into a whole different category cuz most of their rooms are only an occupancy maximum of two. Now, definitely don’t expect to check in your hotel early in Tokyo, at least not without paying for it. They’re very much sticklers for time. And so, if a hotel advertises a check-in time of 300 p.m. and you get there at 2:58, they might very well be asking you to wait for 2 minutes before you can check in at 3:00. If you are getting here really early in the morning and you want to make sure that you can check in at 6:00 in the morning, consider booking the hotel the night before, like call up the hotel and say, “Hey, you want to check in early.” And they’ll generally have a charge for that. Either an early check-in fee or they’ll like reserve you the day before, but don’t miss the day you come in. Cuz if you didn’t communicate that to them, then you’re not here by like midnight or 2 a.m., they’ll likely cancel your reservation. Checkout time’s also very strict. If they advertise a 10 or 11 checkout time, they’re very strict and they will be calling you or at your door knocking probably at 11:02 if you did check out at 11:00. Now, we talked about luggage shipping earlier in the getting in section, but you can also use it for switching between hotels. Most hotels will have the service that they can ship your luggage off to the next hotel. Usually, they’ll have a cut off of the day before, something like 10 or 11:00 at night that you need to get your suitcase down to the lobby so they can get it to your next hotel the next day. Now, the Mimaru Ueno East Hotel that we’re staying at right now, they actually advertise same day delivery for hotels in the central part of Tokyo. If you’re going further a field, then there need more time for that. All right. So, before I get into the different categories of hotels that are in Tokyo, cuz they might be different than what you’re used to hearing, the Curious Princess right here, what she’s been playing with this whole time, we went to the Disney flagship store last night in Shinjuku and we got this bunny right here. This is a special bunny. You can only get the Disney flagship store, the N Rabbit. And then this is a Elsa Frozen light up costume kit uh that’s only avail set that’s only available in Japan. And I use this for for for the B house, but it was actually for these. Yes, the light up kit comes in this little box right here. And it’s the perfect size for the bunny to sleep in. Categories of hotel in Tokyo. Business hotels. If you see a business hotel, that’s not a Marriott Hilton or Hyatt. Business hotels in Tokyo are very small rooms, very close to train stations, convenient to business travelers who are coming and going, generally only spending one night in there. Generally, not with much luggage. You’re going to find probably some of the best value hotels to be in the business hotel category. Toyoko Inn is an example of one of those. But if I mentioned Japanese hotels are sticklers on number of people, Toyoko Inn is extra sticklers on that cuz their rooms are really really tiny. You will of course find lots of luxury hotels in Tokyo. And I feel like sometimes Tokyo gets a bad rap for the cost of hotels. Yes, there are absolutely hotel rooms that are um hundreds to thousands of dollars a night. Most of them aren’t if you’re not staying at the Four Seasons or the Mandarin Oriental. But then there’s another what I would consider luxury category which is the luxury rioon or the luxury Japanese style in. So that is a Japanese style in typically look like rooms like this but we’ll have more full service. This is an apartment. So we just check in like in a hotel at a desk but a Japanese style in a rioon. There will often be people in kimonos who will greet you, take you to your room, make tea in your room. Food is often included in that experience. There are not many Rioons in Tokyo. You will find some of them, but if you want the most Japanese cultural experience, stay at one of those. What do you have in your mouth, princess? The princess lost her candy. Go get your candy. When we checked into this hotel, they gave her candy. They were very nice. They’re capsule hotels that basically um they’re like these little capsules. They kind of look like little almost like coffins that you go sleep in. They’re not really meant for visitors. They’re really meant for traveling businessmen that miss the last train and need a place to sleep. Of course, I say business men, they’re generally gender separate. So, there will be capsule hotels or floors or areas just for men to sleep in. And then there will be capsule hotels or areas just for women to sleep in. If you want to sleep together with somebody, it’s not going to be in a capsule hotel. Those are designed for just one person. If you’re looking for something even a little bit shorter, Tokyo has plenty of hotels you can rent by hour. Those are called love hotels. That’s as far as we’re going to get on that topic in this video. You will certainly find host, which are probably going to be cleaner and nicer than you’ll find in many cities around the world. And finally, if you’re looking for one of the most bargain places to stay, consider the manga cafes. These are like comic book cafes. And the way these places work is you pay a set fee to go in and read the manga and enjoy the space. But they recognize that many people might stay there for not just 20, 30 minutes or an hour. they might stay there for hours and actually sleep in the chairs overnight. Definitely make sure it’s one that actually supports that before you book it if that’s what you’re expecting to do. And definitely shop around when you’re looking to book your hotel room because in Tokyo, the hotels don’t always advertise the lowest price on their own website. I’ve often found lowest prices booking through third-party booking websites. One of our favorites that we’re using right now is called planin.com and it’s actually where we booked this hotel on. We got it for like 10% lower than they advertise directly on the Memorial website. So, if you want to check that out, I’ll put a link in the description or a QR code up here. You can check out Planin. To get the cheapest rates and see the discounts, you do need to sign up for an account. Sign up is free and then you’ll see some of those cool insider deals. Final note on hotels in Tokyo. If you are not a smoker, beware. Some hotels still have smoking rooms. Yes, that is absolutely true. So, if you don’t like the smell of smoke in your room, look, it’s not many, but it’s still some, make sure you booked that non-smoking room. Uh, we are heading to Sai next. Uh, and in Sai, we’re staying at a JR hotel near the train station, and one of the hotels we looked at was really popular cuz there’s a Tanabata festival going on. One of them only had smoking rooms available. All the other non-smoking rooms were sold out, so we were definitely definitely not doing that. Number 12 is shopping. And Tokyo has shopping for everybody. Cheap shopping, expensive shopping. But if you like upscale shopping, the heart of upscale shopping in Tokyo is the Ginsa district right here. This street on Sundays, they close it off to vehicular traffic. It’s the best day to come here and do upscale shopping. But in Ginsa, you’re going to find all the big Japanese department stores, all the luxury brands. Though bring your credit card cuz you’re going to need it cuz it’s expensive to shop in Ginsa. Another great shopping district is Harajuku. This one you just take the JR Yamanote line to Harajuku station and head down Takashita Street. This street right here that has all of these people on it. This neighborhood was made famous in the US by Gwen Stefani from her song Harajuku Lovers. But this is the center of youth culture in Tokyo. So, uh, for the teens and early 20somes, lots of great stuff to buy here. Uh, and lots of great things to eat here as well. You’ll find things in this neighborhood to be on the cheaper end of the price scale. Now, many people think that Tokyo is a 24-hour city, night and day. And while there are people around night and day, stores actually close really early. I’m in Shabuya right now, and there’s tons of people walking around. But as soon as 9:00 hit, pretty much all the stores in this area close just like that. Many department stores close at 8:00. You’ll find other stores closing at 6:00. So, make sure to check the closing times before you go shopping so you don’t miss when they close. And when they say they close at 9 or 8, they will close precisely at that time. Don’t expect to buy something at 8:02 when the shop closed at 8. And the 13th thing to know is about getting mobile data and staying connected while you’re in Tokyo. We’ve done a few different things in the past for getting mobile data in Japan, and I’ll share all three options with you. First, just getting a standard SIM card. You can pick them up at a lot of stores when you get here. Uh, two, we’ve also rented pocket Wi-Fis. Pocket Wi-Fi, it’s like a mobile router, like a Wi-Fi router. It basically has one SIM card in it and then your whole group can tether to that. We’ve used Ninja Wi-Fi. We you basically pick it up at the airport. You use it for your whole trip. It’s great if you have a lot of people traveling with you that all want to get on the internet. It’s great for OC girl, myself, our daughter, the Curious Princess, all to just basically connect via Wi-Fi to that to get data. But my new favorite way to get mobile data while I’m traveling internationally is to use an e SIM. The great thing about using eims, you can get it all set up from the comfort of your home before you leave and you don’t have to pick up any physical things once you get to your destination. And you definitely don’t have to hunt for the ninja Wi-Fi desk wherever it is in Haneda airport. Now, for this trip, I got one from my favorite eim provider and the sponsor of this video, Sim Local. Sim Local is an ESIM marketplace where you can pick from a variety of different providers and packages depending upon your data and length of stay needs, all for a really good price. I got the 7-day unlimited data eim from AU, and it was $19. That’s a super good deal. The whole process from purchase to installation took less than 5 minutes. When I landed in Japan, all I had to do was toggle on the eim and voila, I had data right away, even before getting into the airport from the comfort of my airplane seat. By the way, it’s actually really hard to get a phone number in Japan. So, the eims or the SIM cards that you would like pick up or buy from a random vendor or the pocket Wi-Fi does not come with a phone number. Uh if you want to get a phone number in Japan, that’s a much more bigger thing about like you gota apply and you gota like prove who you are. Um so data only probably the way to go for most visitors. Oh, if you do want to use SIM local to get your eim the way I did it, uh you can use code yellow over there and you’ll get yourself 10% off. Oh, and before I go, where am I right now? This is fish market. Uh well, there was a big fish market here, but the neighborhood, it’s still a whole neighborhood dedicated to seafood. I just had myself a uh oonie seafood bowl that was really quite delicious. Number 14 is about smoking. Tokyo has a really interesting culture about smoking in that first of all, there is no smoking while walking on the sidewalks in most of Tokyo. Why? They don’t want you to smoke your cigarette and bother other people or run into somebody. So, if you want to smoke out in the city, you have to find a designated smoking area. Also, if you’re not a smoker, you should know many restaurants still have smoking sections, particularly isizakaya. So, if you don’t like smoke, make sure to find a non-smoking restaurant, cuz the non-smoking section doesn’t really do all that much to keep the smoke away. Number 15, there’s a serious lack of public trash cans in Tokyo. Where are you going to find trash cans? Not really out on the street or in public places. You will find them in convenience stores. You will find them in train stations. You’ll find them in department stores. You often do not find trash cans in public bathrooms, in public parks, and in public places. So, what are you supposed to do with your trash? Well, what most Japanese do is they’ll carry a plastic bag with them and put the trash that they generate in the bag and then throw it away when they get back home or throw it away when they get back to your hotel. So, that’s the option or to seek out one of those places that I mentioned. Another thing is if you’re out and about, say you’re eating something, you get a snack, uh, to throw it away where you bought it from. Because if it’s a to- go thing and it doesn’t look like there’s a place to throw it, if you bring it back to the counter and just say, “Hey, I just had this pudding cup. What do I do with it?” They’ll know that you want to give it back to them to throw it away. Number 16, let’s talk about toilets. When you’re walking around Tokyo, you’ll eventually need to relieve yourself. Where should you look for toilets? Well, one of the best places you’ll find public toilets is in train stations. Nearly every train station and every subway station will have public toilets. They are typically in the paid area of the station though, so make sure you use the restroom after you get off the train, but before you leave the wickets, and the same way in the other direction. Other places that are great for public toilets are department stores and some convenience stores will have restrooms as well. Most restaurants have them, but maybe not the smaller ones. You’ll also find public toilets in parks and some other big public places. I would say public toilets in Tokyo are generally of the pretty good and pretty clean variety. You should know about information desks and booths that they’re actually useful when you’re in Tokyo. I when you’re traveling around Europe and a lot of other places, information desks are just great places to get sold tickets and time shares and these sorts of things. But if you’re looking for really good information about where something is in a mall or you’re looking in a train station and you see an information desk, that’s a really great place to get local maps for the neighborhood. Ask what to do, ask what to see. And in Tokyo, pretty much all the information desks are staffed by people who speak English. So when you need information, find the little signless information, usually with a question mark or an exclamation point. Number 18 is rules. There are a lot of rules to follow in Japan. I’d encourage you to brush up on some Japanese etiquette before you visit Tokyo. And almost any place or site or attraction, you’ll be presented with a good set of rules before you come. Uh if you’re wondering what this one is, this isn’t no walking. This one here says no running at this particular shrine. No eating, no throwing trash away, no sitting on steps. You can probably figure out what those are. But some other ones you should know in Tokyo, people really respect lines. If you see a line, don’t be cutting in line. Two, people really respect the red light and the no crossing symbol. People here don’t cross the street. They don’t jaywalk when they’re not supposed to. And finally, people don’t eat while walking. It’s considered rude in Japan to eat while walking. You might get a slight pass as a foreigner, but you’ll probably get some dirty looks. If you buy something from a convenience store and you want to eat it, the general etiquette is you buy that thing from the convenience store or the food from the vending machine and you eat it right there in front of the store at the vending machine and then you throw it away and then you continue on your way. So, don’t buy that Starbucks to go and think you’re going to be drinking it on the run. If you want to drink it quickly, get it for there. If you’re getting it for to go, it’s to drink at whatever your destination is, not while you’re walking. All right. All right, now let’s talk about some of the best things to do in Tokyo that we haven’t already talked about yet. And the first one on this list is going to be the Tokyo Disney Resort. There are two Disney theme parks in Tokyo. They’re right next to each other. Tokyo Disneyland, the original one in Tokyo. It is based on Disneyland in California or the Magic Kingdom in Orlando. Uh there’s a second theme park, the newer one that I’m in right now, which is Disney Sea. This one is a seabased theme park. There’s a hotel. This is a theme park, Hotel Mira Costa. This is like Venice land over here, but there’s also like an Aladdin land over this way. There’s a big volcano. It is an amazingly themed theme park. There’s also a New York City area that’s based on um New York City. So, whether you’ve got kids that enjoy the Disney characters or you’re a Disney adult, definitely consider checking out one or two of these theme parks. If you are going to do these theme parks, then you should definitely consider moving hotels, especially if you’re going to do two of them because it’s definitely worth two or 3 days for big Disney files. Oh, and if you want to know more about visiting Tokyo Disney Sea, I’ve got a whole video on our visit here with all the tips, tricks, and mistakes that you need to know. Now, if you’re looking to shop for Disney merchandise and you’re not going to Disneyland, then check out the Disney flagship store. This one’s new since my last update of this video. It is in Shinjuku. This store has three stories of Disney merchandise and there are limited edition things you can only get at this store. It is really cool. Admission is free and you can get some cool photos with some Disney characters here, too. some neat photo ops up on the third floor, I guess, second floor, and down in the basement. Now, Tokyo doesn’t have a lot of old historical buildings left because many of them were destroyed in the World War II. So, if you want to see old Tokyo, old Japan, you need to get outside of Tokyo. And where we are right now with the Curious Princess, we are at the Edeto Tokyo Open Air Architectural Museum where they’ve taken a bunch of these like old buildings, brought them together, and they’ve done a great job putting them into like little streetcapes. You can go inside the buildings. When we were here today, they even had someone selling oldtimey candy. This candy when you put in your mouth actually makes a whistle. Visit Tokyo’s really amazing aquariums. There are lots of really great aquariums in Tokyo. The one we’re at right now is Aqua Park Shinagawa. This one, their specialty is a dolphin show. So, you go in and you get to see a dolphin show in addition to seeing a lot of great aquatic life. The aquariums are really clean. And they’ve even got a couple rides in here, too. The carousel uh is 500 yen. Free for kids under six, but a adult has to accompany them, so it’s not totally free. You have the stationary seats that are usually stationary in most carousels. These oysters, they actually move up and down, so you get a little bit of fun even if you’re riding with really really little kids. They also have some big ship ride, but you have to be 120 cm tall to ride that one. Oh. So, we’ve got to wait. few years for her to come back and ride that ride. Another aquarium that I really like is the Sunnita Aquarium. That one’s at the Tokyo Skytree. That aquarium is famous for its penguins. Pro tip, these aquariums can be quite busy, particularly on the weekends, particularly in the daytime. If you want to get away from the crowds, then come late at night. This aquarium right here, the Aqua Park Shinagawa, uh, was open until 900 p.m., although last admission is 8:00 p.m. Oh, and if you want to see the dolphin show, I’d recommend getting to it like an hour early and then putting something down on the seats that you don’t value too much, like some umbrellas or a water bottle to save your seats. It’s Japan, so say, and that’s what everybody does to mark their seats. Cuz they put it down so they so they can like say it’s my nobody gets on that seat. and mine. Now, in addition to a whole bunch of great paid attractions in Tokyo, there’s also a lot of great fun, free things to do. And some of them are just to stroll around some of Tokyo’s super unique neighborhoods and soak up the atmosphere. Now, one of my favorite unique neighborhoods is called Kapabashi Street, which kind of translates into kitchen town. For over a century, it’s been the city’s premier wholesale district for professional chefs and anyone involved in the food service industry. You’ll find 170 shops on this street, each focusing on a particular aspect of the restaurant trade. From shops that specialize in nothing but knives to shops that only sell pottery. But what I think is most entertaining about the street are the streets. They’re the shops that sell the realistic plastic food samples. These are the ones that you see in the windows of all the restaurants in Tokyo. These models are used to display their menu items. And you can you can buy them here for yourself. Not not just for a restaurant. You can buy everything from a single piece of sushi to an entire bowl of ramen. Another cool neighborhood to visit is Amiyoko near Uweno Station. It’s one of Tokyo’s few open air flea markets. It runs along and under the elevated JR Yamanote line tracks, and the vibe of Amayyoko is completely different from the polished modern shopping districts of Shabuya Orza. Here, it’s loud, crowded, and a bit gritty, but it has an undeniable energy and some old Tokyo charm. Now, if it’s temples and shrines you’re after, I’ve got three recommendations for you. First, the historic Senoji Temple in Asaka. This is Tokyo’s oldest temple, and the approach along the main street lined with traditional shops is just as captivating as the temple itself. Do make sure you go early, otherwise the crowds here can be intense. One that has some less crowds that I enjoy is the Miji Jingu Shrine. This is tucked away amidst a vast bamboo forest, yet it’s in the middle of the city. It’s kind of odd how that works, but it’s really a peaceful escape from the city’s hustle and bustle, perfect for a contemplative stroll. And one that I recently discovered, and one of the ones that I actually find is the most picturesque in Tokyo, is the He shrine. This one is kind of away from a lot of the major touristy areas, which is why I haven’t been there until this past year. It’s kind of on the back side of the Imperial Palace and is most famous for its Tory gate tunnel. It’s a major draw for visitors to go up this tunnel of red Tory gates up the staircase to approach the temple. Now, if you don’t want to do the stairs, uniquely, this temple also has an escalator to take you to the top in case the stairs aren’t your thing. Now, if you want to spice up your photos at the temples and shrines, consider renting a kimono or yucata for the day. There are tons of traditional Japanese attire rental shops all around Tokyo, and it’ll make your experience even more memorable. It’ll make you feel like the performers at one of my favorite Tokyo stage shows. It used to be called the robot restaurant. That doesn’t exist anymore. It’s now called the samurai restaurant. It’s still got the wacky costumes, talented dancers, choreographed fight scenes, but a few less robots. Still a lot of fun, though. And the last thing to know is we’ve got even more videos on Tokyo and beyond. If you want to see our vlogs where we like spend a week across Japan, check out this one right here. If you want to see some of our favorite destinations in Tokyo, you’ll find some of those guides on the screen or a link in the description to our entire Japan playlist with over a 100 videos on this country. Fellow explorers, I won’t say goodbye because as usual, I’ll see you in the next

Planning a trip to Tokyo? This comprehensive guide has everything you need to know to make your visit unforgettable! ✅ Get 10% off eSIM at Simlocal with code “YELLOW” here: https://yelloww.co/simlocal

As one of my favorite cities in the world, Tokyo offers a unique blend of high-tech marvels and ancient traditions, and I’ve packed all my best tips into this single video. Whether it’s your first time or you’re a returning visitor, this guide covers it all.

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Table of contents:
00:00 Tokyo Travel Guide: Everything to Know Before You Go
00:25 1. General Information of Tokyo
01:50 2. Orientation in Tokyo
05:08 3. Getting In to Tokyo
08:40 4. Getting Around Tokyo
11:51 5. When to Go to Tokyo
13:43 6. Language in Tokyo
16:59 7. Money in Tokyo
21:17 8. Food in Tokyo
26:38 9. Drinking in Tokyo
27:39 10. Vending Machines in Tokyo
29:26 11. Where to Stay in Tokyo
41:13 12. Shopping in Tokyo
42:47 13. Mobile Data in Tokyo
44:59 14. Smoking in Tokyo
45:32 15. Trash in Tokyo
46:26 16. Toilets in Tokyo
47:09 17. Information Desks in Tokyo
47:44 18. Rules in Tokyo
48:56 19. Things to Do in Tokyo

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Microphone: DJI Mic 3 – https://amzn.to/3JUvcQT
Day Bag: Pacsafe LS250 Anti-theft Shoulder Bag – http://amzn.to/2h0YCNt

🎵 We use music from Epidemic Sound: https://yelloww.co/epidemic