It's a beautiful country, been twice myself, once on student exchange in 2006-2007, and again with my ex in 2023.

Thanks for sharing!

Lovely! I'm in Japan right now, mainly for learning the language. I had two tandem meetings yesterday, which was fun, but also quite exhausting, lol. My japanese is getting better every day though!

I really have to visit Kyoto this time. Anybody got any tips how to get cheap shinkansen tickets for a trip from Tokio? =P

Kyoto is absolutely gorgeous.

My photos from 2006:

Shinkansen is already pretty cheap. If you want cheaper you can do bus or local trains, but the time investment is higher.

I paid 38.040 Yen now for a trip to Kyoto and back. I wouldn't exactly call that cheap. But whatever, at least its fast. =D

It's honestly not cheap at all. Especially when you consider that everything else is so cheap because of the exchange rate.

The difference is that the ticket price stays the same. In many other countries it's cheaper when you buy in advance or travel during hours when they won't sell as many tickets. That's great when you have to be somewhere on short notice but as a tourist you plan ahead weeks and months in advance and still have to pay the same high price.

Also I checked prices when I used the Shinkansen from Osaka to Tokyo (well I disembarked in Yokohama) and a flight would have cost the same amount.

For example (express train):

Milan to Rome (~570km; 3h15min) is 38 € if you book in advance.

Osaka to Tokyo (~515km;2h20min) is around 85 € currently. And that is with a favourable exchange rate.

I thought Shinkansen was pretty ok value in my opinion especially since trains in my own country cover half the distance at that price (at a fifth of the speed), but it is definitely one of the more expensive parts of the country right now. Food was very cheap considering what you got and lodgings was pretty decent as well.

Standard fee seems to be 13,320 yen right now, so 26,640 round trip. Local train even cheaper at 8500 yen, but you can make that even cheaper.

As above, 13320 yen, is around 75 euro. Much faster and smoother than Euro trains too.

Nice. Was just in Japan myself. Such a beautiful country. Will definitely go back.

Just checked that and it seems that I chose the "green cars" without knowing that that's the first class. I should have switched the language on the machine to english. But I felt so confident at that moment... =D

Yeah, so that's on me. My bad. But even at 13,320 Yen it is still relatively expensive compared to other prices in Japan. But it's alright, I won't complain. 

On the plus side, a McChicken costs 190 Yen. That's 1,07 Euro. In germany you have to pay 6 Euro for that thing, lol.

Looking forward to my first trip in a shinkansen!