Customer Reviews

Lonely Planet Discover Japan (Full Color Country Travel Guide)

5 star:		(13)
4 star:		(20)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I lived in Japan for quite a few years, and while I don't need a travel guide to the country anymore I am always curious on how well new travel guides highlight all the madness and charm that can be found there. Consequently, I own a lot of travel guides to Japan. I have also hosted a lot of visitors in Japan, and have learned over the years what works and what doesn't.

I admit that I have never been a huge fan of the Lonely Planet series, as their books tend to be just lists of places with tongue-in-cheek humor but not a terrible amount of depth. I have the previous Japan (Country Guide) and this "Discover Japan" volume covers much of the same information, only updated with color photographs and some flash and pizzazz.

Right from the start, I had some problems with "Discover Japan." First off, it touts Japan as "one of the cheapest countries in the developed world" which is simply wrong. Japan is incredibly expensive to travel in, with Tokyo being one of the most expensive cities on the planet. Consider that this is a country whose smallest paper currency is equivalent to US $10 (1000 yen), and dollar coins (100 yen) are just chump change. I lived in the Kansai area, which is not as expensive as Tokyo, and even then it was hard to step out your door for less than a hundred dollars a day.

Along with this, it says that Visa and Mastercard are "widely excepted," which is completely untrue and a dangerous thing to say. Japan is an almost entirely cash-based society, and I have had to pay for more than one visitor who blindly ordered at a large restaurant just assuming they could pay with their credit card and being shocked when they are told "cash only." Even the ubiquitous convenience stores don't always take plastic, and the cash machines close at normal bank hours so you have to get used to carrying large sums of cash around with you.

Next, we are presented with a "Japan's Top 25 Experiences" list, with "Kyoto's Temples and Gardens" being in the number one position. (The photo included is actually the Torii path at Fushimi Inari Shrine, made famous in the film Memoirs of a Geisha but located outside of Kyoto city, so don't look for it there.) Probably my number one advice to visitors is "don't waste too much time in Kyoto."

Don't get me wrong, Kyoto has some beautiful areas, but the dreamy city sold to you by guidebooks simply doesn't exist, and those pockets of cherry-blossom lined streets are carefully tucked away in concrete urban sprawl. On top of that, some of Kyoto's most famous buildings, like the Golden Pavilion Kinkakuji, are nothing more than modern replicas of older structures. (The modern Kinkakuji was built in 1955, for example) The nearby Nara Park, on the other hand, with its sprawling wilderness, tame deer than can be hand-fed, and giant Todai-ji temple with the massive Great Buddha statue, is always much more of a crowd pleaser. There is decent coverage of Nara Park in the book, but it deserves more attention than its more famous neighbor Kyoto.

Temples and Shrines are very much the focus of "Discover Japan," and almost every regional chapter highlights the local version. This is the book for what we call the "green tea and onsens" traveler who wants to step back into Japan's past that they see in samurai films rather than the modern country. I love shrines and temples probably even more than the next guy, but every visitor I have had to Japan gets "templed-out" pretty quickly, and has more fun standing in the busy street of Dontonbori Osaka with the mechanical signs waving tentacles at you and pumping out steam and every street hawker shouting for your attention. Yet Dotonbori gets little more than a brief paragraph. I was happy to see the Osaka Aquarium get a mention on the "must see" list, but I have to admit that the Osaka Aquarium is nothing compared to the much-larger Okinawa Aquarium which deserves the spot instead.

There is a lot more that could be done here. For example, every area of Japan has its own regional food which could have been mentioned, or even cool things sake brewery tours or some of Japan's more unique attractions like the Studio Ghibli museum or the Instant Ramen museum or even some of the amazing roller coasters that Japan is famous for like the terrifying Eejanaika "4-D" roller coaster at Fuji-Q Highland amusement park near the base of Mt. Fuji. From reading this "Discover Japan" guidebook, you get the idea that Japan has not changed for a thousand years and you could expect to encounter shaven-headed men walking around in kimono and geta and white-faced geisha blushing around every corner.

The benefits of "Discover Japan" is that the book is really well put-together and visually beautiful. The pages are color coded for easy reference and the full-color pictures make a difference. There is a feature I really enjoyed, where a professional guide from each major region gives their personal "Top Ten" list of what to see. Also, the place names are written in the Japanese language, which is essential as the further you get away from Tokyo the less English-language signs you will see, especially on menus and in train stations.

My favorite Japan guidebook remains Gateway to Japan, which is admittedly out-dated and not ideal for a casual tourist but it is by far the most informative. Some of the local city guides, like Old Kyoto are also worth it and I have found some hidden gems there like the Japanese print dealer Nishiharu. If you plan on stepping into the steaming water of an onsen (and you are a fool to travel all the way to Japan and miss out on that!) then you will need How to Take a Japanese Bath. For visual splendor and to get you excited, the Japan (Eyewitness Travel Guides) is a good investment.

For me, even though it was well designed this "Discover Japan" book was just lacking too much, and only showed one face of the multi-faceted culture of Japan. Anyone planning a trip is better off picking up a few different books and making their own plans rather than following Lonely Planet's pre-set itineraries and experiences.

Disclosure: I have owned and used only one other travel book in my life, so I don't have much to compare this one too. I am simply giving my impressions as a novice travel planner.

First off, I actually went to Japan!! This year! I spent 6 weeks in the Kansai region for a language program, and I traveled to Osaka, Kyoto, Nara, Tokyo, Shirakawa-go, Takayama, Gifu, Inuyama, Hiroshima, Himeiji, Sekigahara, Mt. Koya, and Mt. Hiei. I got this book before I left, but unfortunately forgot to take it with me. I did read the entire section on the Kansai region and some highlights of Gifu prefecture before I left. So as you might guess, my review will focus heavily on the section of the book featuring the Kansai region.

The book is nicely arranged: it starts out with some important things to know, gives some suggested itineraries, and then presents places to visit divided by region. Each region contains a regional map and a list of highlights of the region. It is then divided into cities in the region, giving some history, maps, and general information, before listing the attractions.

At the back of the book is a valuable little section called "Japan in Focus". It explains some about the history of Japan, the food, and various aspects of travel that are useful to know (such as explaining ryokan and onsen). I missed this section the first time I went through the book (I thought it was just another region section). I think it would have been much better placed at the beginning of the book.

I do agree with some other reviewers; some of the attractions given prominent positions should have been smaller, while some of the attractions shoved into the background should have been brought forward, but I am sure not everyone would agree with me and you can't please everyone. I don't believe that anyone should rely on a single source of information when planning their trip. I used this book to get an idea of what was out there and places I might want to visit, then I did more extensive research online. This book isn't all that big, and that is one of the things I like about it - it is very portable. And for its size, I think that it did an excellent job of choosing which attractions it included. One thing I do concede is that it spent too many pages on Kyoto. Of the number of pages devoted to the Kansai region (home to tons of famous and beautiful historical sites), more than half is focused on Kyoto. I had mixed feelings about Kyoto. It did have many interesting places to visit, but after all the idealistic pictures I saw before going, I had expected a bit more. I think that if I had actually stayed in the city itself rather than take day trips from Osaka, I might have enjoyed it more.

Note: Kinkakuji is beautiful, but if you've seen a picture of it, then there isn't really much of a reason to see it in person. It looks just like its pictures - from all angles. It does have nice grounds though. Instead, visit Kiyomizu-dera!

If you plan on spending a few nights in the Kansai region, the Kansai Thru Pass is a must. The three day pass (currently 5,000¥, also available as a two-day pass for a little less) lets you ride trains and buses unlimitedly (though not JR lines) for approx $17 a day (and the days do not have to be consecutive!). The JR pass is awesome (must be purchase outside of Japan!), but only if you intend to do long distance travel. The book covers the JR pass quite well, but I had to scour the internet to find the KTP. WHY?! To get anywhere in Japan you have to take a train, but for some reason the only train pass that is advertised anywhere is the JR pass, which is a little over $300 for one consecutive week.

I loved the Kansai region, but my favorite part of Japan was the Central Honshu area, specifically the areas in the Japanese Alps. Takayama and Shirakawa-go (and Inuyama) were the highlight of my entire 6-week trip. The book's section on this area is not very long, but it contains the good general information, and the information on the bus from Takayama to Shirakawa-go was accurate.

One reviewer complains that the book inaccurately represents Japan as a inexpensive place to travel. I agree with them (though $100 is ridiculous), but I can also see why the book might make that statement. Admissions were generally below $5, if you stay in a youth hostel (pretty nice actually) it is about $35 a person, and if you get the train passes you can get all over the place for a relatively cheap price. Don't think that it will be cheaper to travel in Japan than it would be in America, but remember that America also doesn't have nearly the amount of cool stuff to see! My lodging was paid for by the program I was with, but outside of that I spent about $1200 the entire trip (6 weeks or 42 days), which averages a little under $30 a day. This includes all transportation, admittance, food, and souvenirs.

The last thing I have to say is that the color really mattered! I didn't think that it was all that important that a travel book have colored pictures (the last one I used didn't), and admittedly the color didn't reveal any missing details, but seeing the images in color just made it seem more real and made me much more excited about going to the places pictured. I also think that it made the maps easier to read.

I purchased this book in advance of a 1-week trip to Japan. I decided to take this over the thicker, more expensive, "classic" Japan guide, because I thought it might be a more focused, lighter option for a short trip.

It seems that a lot of good content was edited out in favor of glossy photos and top-ten lists. The lists are fine by themselves, but most repeat content from elsewhere in the book, resulting in a lot of duplicated information, which is not always located where you would expect. For example, try finding the best Onsen (or Sentoh) in Kyoto, and you'll need to find the "Best Onsens" list, far away from the Kyoto-specific section...

By giving so many pages over to lists and photos, the city pages suffer, and a lot of what i'd consider must-see sights are left out... Ultimately, I was disappointed, and ended up using printed pdfs from a downloaded copy of the original Japan guide over this attractive but frustrating guidebook.

Unlike several of the other reviews that compare this book to other travel guides in the book series, this is my first The Lonely Planet Discovery book. My daughter plans on studying in Japan for the Rotary foreign exchange student program and we are positive this book will prepare for her travels to come.

Japan, which is know as the "Land of the Rising Sun" can be hectic as well as tranquil depending where you want to go. Discover Japan will help you decide if you want to go to a huge metropolitan city like Tokyo or go and enjoy the peaceful splendor of the Japanese Alps. Adventure out to ancient temples or palaces you want to see.

It includes information on places to visit in Japan, as well as places that you may not find appealing to you, Japanese customs, festivals, dining, calendar of events, climates and even some basic historical information about each region. There is so much information that I would not be able to list it all. There tons and tons of pictures, I would say almost every single page has one. The pictures are so beautiful that they make you want to visit each place listed. The color codes sections will be extremely helpful to quickly find the different regions, this makes it easy to read and navigate.

This guide is very useful for your next or even your first trip to Japan as it covers most major cities therefore you can plan your trip ahead of time.

My wife and I are seasoned Japan travelers (and occasional tour guides). We lived in the Tohoku region for a year and have visited Japan once or twice a year for over a decade, so we know our way around and have visited a lot of places. We both agree that Lonely Planet's "Discover Japan" is a great guidebook for anyone traveling to Japan.

The book is divided into sections and are filled with the main highlights and attractions for each destination. The book is well organized, starting with the places most tourists will likely visit (Tokyo/Kanto area and Kyoto/Kansai area).

This latest edition is very up-to-date, featuring current photos of what you can expect when visiting Japan, as well as recent currency conversion rates and prices. All too often I look at travel guides to Japan full of photos taken 25 years ago--that is not the case here. And one of the things I like about this book is the directory at the end of the book, which gives information on food, history, and culture, as well as good, sound travel advice. I found it to be full of the exact same things I would say to people I'd be taking around and it's a good insight into what to expect when traveling to what can be, despite its modern, Western appearance, a very foreign country.

My biggest complaint about this book is the lack of directions or even a decent rail map for the greater Tokyo metropolitan area. If you're not going on a tour to Japan, most, if not all, of your travel will be done via Japan's extensive rail network, and it can be confusing, if not overwhelming, to attempt to visit the places listed here without some idea of how to get there. I'd suggest downloading the free English language map from the JR (Japan Railways) website if you'll be using this book as your guide. It'll give you a better idea of how to plan your days without hopping all over and wasting precious time.

Also, I'd like to note that this book doesn't give a lot of suggestions for restaurants or eateries and the reason for that is simple: the best places to eat in Japan aren't five-star restaurants. They're hole-in-the-wall, mom-and-pops establishments where recipes have been handed down for generations and have evolved into near perfection. I often find that some of the best places I've eaten at cost me less than $15 for a meal...with the exception of sushi. The food industry is so cutthroat in Japan that if I'd eaten at a small restaurant where the food was terrible, odds were it wouldn't be there when I went back. My general rule of thumb: If there's a crowd of Japanese people eating there, chances are it's good.

So if you're planning a trip to Japan, get this book to fill your itinerary. It's a huge, diverse country with lots of scenic, historic spots, and this book does a great job of listing the highlights. From shopping to temples to gardens to nature hikes, "Discover Japan" is a great place to start discovering Japan.

First a major disclaimer: Though I have made at least 4 trips to Japan, I did not take this guide there, so perhaps it is better than I reviewed if you actually go to Japan.

I have used Lonely Plant guides for years and in many places. I love the guides because they are not like Fodors or Frommers, they are more for the Independent traveller who want off the beaten path. This guide is LP attempt to be Fodors and Frommers which to meet is disappointing. It would be like 7 UP "the uncola" making cola. Everything I love about LP and everything that I dislike about traditional guide books can be found here.

I'm a real Japanophile and have a trunk full of guidebooks to the country. My son has lived and worked there for ten years, and we've visited him several times and covered the length and breadth of the island. If I was forced to return with only one guidebook, it would be this concise and compact little "Lonely Planet" volume.

Too many books like these are all photos and little actual information, but there's a really good balance here between the two. The book divides the country into six major areas, and the copy is informative and fairly comprehensive, with many suggestions of places to eat, stay and see. I especially liked the suggested itineraries and the 25 things you should see in Japan (though I didn't agree with all of them -- not into skiing, sorry).

Along with this book, though, you will need a Japanese phrase book of some kind, since there are very few English speakers in Japan. I'd also recommend you get detailed subway maps for the major cities you'll be visiting, since public transportation is the only way to go in Japan, and you won't find those detailed maps here. Those caveats aside, this is a very useful volume for the Western traveler to Japan.

DISCOVER JAPAN by Rowthorn, Bender, Firestone, Hornyak, Walker, Warham, and Yanaghihara, is a 400 page book printed on semi-glossy paper. Almost every page has at least one color photograph.

MULTITUDES OF MAPS. Maps are found on pages 2, 8-9, 33, 35, 37, 53, 64-65, 66, 68, 70, 72, 83, 89, 93,99, 103, 112-113, 115, 116, 120, 124, 130, 150, 152, 157, and so on. It is evident that the authors want the readers to be well-oriented, as far as sense of direction is concerned.

ART AND ARCHITECTURE. Photographs of art, e.g., statues and paintings, can be found on pages 4, 17, 58, 74, 86, 92, 94, 100, 104, 107, 142, and so on. Photographs of architecture, for example, temples, are found on on pages 3, 12, 14, 16, 25, 57, 88, 101, 102, 105, 106, 119, 122, 132, and so on. I was disappointed not to see any photographs of the trio of monkeys known as THE THREE EVILS, located at Nikkô Tôshô-gû that is a Shinto shrine located in Nikkô, Tochigi Prefecture, Japan. Tôshô-gû is dedicated to Tokugawa Ieyasu, the founder of the Tokugawa shogunate

NATURAL LANDSCAPE. The book also provides coverage of the natural landscape. Therefore, travelers interested in mountains, hiking trails, waterfalls, natural stone formations, and such, will find solace in this comprehensive guidebook. The book's disclosure of natural wonders includes a mangrove swamp (page 290), trees that resemble California redwoods (page 290), mossy trees (p. 299), sea stacks (p. 311), coral reefs (p. 38, 319), ski resorts (p. 354-356), the "Japanese Alps" (p. 18, 28, 41, 166-175, 183-185), exotic islands (p. 21, 38), mountain hiking (p. 29), Mt.Fuji (p. 33, 88-92), rock formations (p. 244), and volcanic scenes (p. 251). Obviously, these disclosures represent only a fraction of what might be of interest to the traveler.

OTHER NOTABLE THINGS. The writing also discloses notable festivals, fish markets, shrines, museums, special neighborhoods in Tokyo, and even notable traffic intersections (Shibuya) (page 71). I believe that this same traffic intersection is featured in the movie, BARAKA.

HISTORY. The book provides tidbits of ancient history here and there, e.g., "Kyoto was first settled in the 7th centry and by 794 it became the capital of Japan" (page 110), and "Takayama was established in the late 16th century as the castle town of the Kanamori clan but in 1692 it was placed under control of headquarters in Edo." (page 176).

CONCLUSION. Every aspect of this book inspires further interest in Japan. This is a great little encyclopedia.

Having purchased many a LP guide over the years, I was excited to check out their new full-colour series Coincidentally, I'm planning a trip to Japan right now so I ordered their guide via Vine.

What's new:

The highlights of the country are greatly expanded, and the guide starts with "Japan's top 25 experiences" ranging from food and activities to places to visit in full colour with large photos and a paragraph description. I felt like I was able to quickly get a sense of the experiences I would get in Japan, and discovered some new places I hadn't considered before (such as the Japan Alps)

They've also introduced highlights to the beginning of every city or region section, bumping back the overview description to deeper into the guide. The "Things you need to know" section recapping logistical information like emergency contact information, explanations of the neighbourhoods, and other tips are shown right after highlights.

What's gone:

It might be because of the different audience, but detailed information about the history and culture of the country is gone. You'll still find quick explanations for each city or region, but not for the country in general. Also, the fonts are bigger in the coloured guide and the pages thicker, so overall there is less information in the guides.

Experience wise, it's really hard to appreciate how much of a difference the full colour guidebook makes. In the past, I've used LP guides as a reference guide - I'll read the sections that I needed or learn more about a city just as I'm getting to a destination. I had never read any LP guides before from cover to cover, but these new guides are far more engaging, and I was more excited to read through this book. My one complaint is that the font spacing and contrast made actually reading the text harder than their traditional guides.

Overall, I think this guide does a really good job of orienting you to what Japan has to offer at a cursory level. There's a good mix of explanations about the top attractions in an area e.g. visiting the Senso-ji Temple, and things to try (walking across Shibuya Crossing.) I do wish with the colour they could have shown more such as typical huts and hotel rooms and more pictures of signature dishes. And while it does a great job of separating out different regions, I had a hard time finding specific sections (e.g., Food, Drink, Lodging) because the font was so colourful all over the page (but the actual section headers were just black).

This is a really fantastic book if you enjoy travel books or are planning a trip to Japan. You might try getting a more recently published version if it's out, but for most stuff it's still really good. There's also a section with some Japanese phrases in case you need that, but I'd suggest getting a pocket dictionary with phrases and stuff if you just want it for that.

Lonely planet is probably one of my preferred Travel guides.