There are many tourist attractions in Japan that are well known to the Japanese but unknown to foreign tourists.
Kyoto, Nikko and Hakone are visited by many foreign tourists. They are of course also very well known and popular with Japanese tourists.
But depending on the time of year, they can get very crowded.
As a student, I worked as a tour guide and traveled around the world with my clients. I’ve been on the Romantic Road in Germany and the Jungfraujoch in Switzerland more times than I can count.
The clients in my group didn’t want to hear Japanese when they were traveling. When they travel to a foreign country, they want to interact with the locals and communicate in foreign languages. But in Rothenburg, they met people who spoke Japanese.
Something similar is currently happening in Japan.
You are in Japan, but what you hear is a language other than Japanese.
I explained to my clients that there are a lot of foreign tourists in Nikko and Hakone. Of course it’s a beautiful destination without a doubt, but with this prior knowledge you can get a more accurate picture.
Suggestions for areas with low numbers of foreign tourists were welcomed.
Iiyama is a town in Nagano Prefecture that is still unknown to foreign tourists.
Staying in a tatami room in a nearby onsen ryokan and enjoying Japanese cuisine was a wonderful experience for them.
The Izu Peninsula in Shizuoka Prefecture is also a well-known vacation destination for Japanese, but does not yet attract many foreign tourists. Shimoda, in the southern part of the peninsula, is a well-known historical town. Japan used to be an isolated country until ships from the USA came to Shimoda and demanded that Japan open up.
Japanese tourists come to this seaside town to swim. The main season in Shimoda is therefore the summer. Hotels and ryokan are fully booked at this time of year.
However, it is of course also a beautiful town to visit outside the summer and I recommended it to my clients.
My clients were delighted with the family-run guesthouse on the seafront that I booked for them.
We all don’t want to be disturbed by the hustle and bustle of other tourists, even if we are tourists ourselves. It’s a selfish hope, but perhaps it’s a good one .
Traveling can cause problems.
Missing a train is a common problem.
I made sure to provide my clients with a timetable and let them know in advance where and at which stations they would be stopping.
Japanese place names are of course displayed in Japanese. Sometimes they are also written in English, but not always in the countryside.
This is one of the services I can offer as I want my customers to visit the hidden landscapes of Japan.
The timetable is also written in Japanese, so if you have any difficulties you can ask a local Japanese.
I put the safety of my customers above everything else.
My customers have already returned to their home countries. They are promoting Japan to their friends, which makes me very happy.
*The nice photos were taken by the customer.
