The four of us visited Japan from July 4 to July 18. Thanks for all the help from Fodor Folks. Any errors or omissions are soley the responsibility of the author. And there were some omissions. I don't see how we didn't get to the platforms over the river in Kibune near Kyoto for lunch. And we didn't get to Disney Sea. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

July 3. IAD to NRT. Arrive at 1:30 pm. Activate 14 day railpass (per mrwunrfl) effective the next day, make reservations on certain train trips, get money from ATM, get ticket on Airport Express to the Akasaka Prince (which is not where Lost in Translation was filmed, although it does show up in the last minute or so of the movie). Bus ride nearly 2 hours into the hotel. But no thinking required.

July 5. Up early, off to Fujiya Hotel in Hakone. Drop off luggage. Take Hakone Free Pass incline train, cable car, boat around Hakone. Rain and fog. No views. But hydrangea very pretty. Locals very enthusiastic about hydrangea. Back to hotel. Swim in indoor pool. Explore garden. Look for place to eat. Bed.

July 6. Splurge on breakfast in hotel dining room. White tablecloths, much bowing, fresh orange juice, high ceilings, wood paneling, sunny windows. Train through mountains to Takayama. Taxi to Antique Inn. Shoes to slippers to socks on tatami mats. Screened porch on garden looking out to the river. Look for restaurant. Bed.

July 7. Cross bridge to morning market. Ohio gozaimas seems too long for "good morning" but start saying it anyway. Mumbling with a smile also seems to work. Visit merchant house and have tea. Visit puppet museum. Start out on path with 13 temples and get lost after about 5. Good lunch at Sezyosa. Back to inn. Nap. Rented bike, rode to library with internet. Sent emails, found a book of Tokyo Stories in the english section and read a little. I like libraries. You always feel welcome and righteous. Collected kids for visit to float museum. Dinner at inn.

July 8. Rent bikes, ride to park. Boys see local kid practicing soccer, ask to join him, scrimmage. I play goalie. Exchange addresses. Back to inn. Lunch at coffee shop nearby. Great parfait. Bus to Ogimachi (Shirakawa-go). Can't figure out what the series of times (2400, 24000, 2400, 1800, 1800 etc etc) in lights over the drivers head represent. Arrive, have coffee, wander around. Many old houses with straw roofs. Wonder what we will do for two nights. First night share inn with heavy drinking japanese couple who smoke (jeeze, can't they read the signs?).

July 9. Wander around. See museum. More houses with straw roofs. Examine water wheel. Kids on swings, small zip line. Walk to lookout point. Back to airconditioned coffee shop with duke ellington and free desert. We must evoke a certain sympathy from shopkeepers. Lunch. One son and I go to the local barber, who seems somewhat surprised that we would want a haircut. Great haircut. My 13 year old flattered but declines shave. On to public baths. If people are going to be naked I'd rather it be coed, but we survive. After the baths the kids try the massage chairs, I talk to a local man about US foreign policy. Dinner alone (nobody but us would stay two nights at Omigachi). Read on veranda. Watch people walk by. Crowds thin. Bed.

July 10. Breakfast, read on veranda. Bus to Kanazawa (per kimjapan). Lunch, ATM. Train to Kyoto, taxi to Hirota Guest House and the cottage (per angethereader). Walk through shopping mall, back to Antonio for good tapas (waiter does not speak spanish).

July 11. I bike out for breakfast pastries. Rush to Imperial Garden but miss tour (we were late for the changing of the guard in London too), catch bus to Sanjandendo (1001 buddhas) and taxi to Kiyomizo (temple perched on beams over the edge of a cliff), get lost, taxi to handicraft museum in basement of convention center next to library near Heinan Shrine, dinner take out from convenience store. Bed.

July 12. Morning bike ride with Mary (Mrs. Santamonica) along river, bike ride with older son to library and internet where he checks sports authority site for prices on workout equpment for his birthday. Walk to Nijo Castle, bus to Golden Pavilian. Local kids practice english on us, survey our views on Japan for school project. See them again at lunch. We are good subjects. Waiter runs after us to return Frommers (!) we left at table. Later we spot a geisha in Gion, see many paper lanterns, have dinner with drinking crowd, talk baseball.

July 13. Train to Nara. See big Buddha, 3000 lanterns. Much walking. Very hot. Deer nips Mrs. Santamonica who returns unused deer cookies to the vendor (apparently not many people return deer food to the vendor). More soccer with boys, who have lost two balls by this time. Dinner at dept store in Kyoto, I go off to see night time commerant fishing which was quite cool and my own personal amazing adventure (I only got lost once).

July 14. If you're still reading this you must be very tired. Mary and I bike off to find philosopher's walk, get lost, return to inn. Subway to train station, Hibari shinkansen to Tokyo, Mauranuchi Line to Akasaka Prince. Two rooms on 38th floor! Great rooms, wonderful views. Splurge, pay $8 pp for pool (eschew $20 pp for lounge chair). That night go to swallows vs giants baseball game (per emd). Cheering section with banners, brass horns, umbrellas when swallows score. Great time.

July 15. Morning visit to fish market. Huge frozen tuna cut with band saws. Live eels squiggling. Scollops and noodles for breakfast. Then on to Mitake Station and Ghibli museum (per emd). Great animation wheel, catbus, nice movie. Very hot day. On to Harajuku. Too tired for shrine. Observed Harajuku Girls. Big crowds on Somethingdori. Lunch at thai restaurant, visit Kiddyland. Rain. Back to hotel, then out to Shiboya for ATM and fish and chips at Irish Pub. Many lights. Didn't see Bill Murray.

July 16. Breakfast at McDonalds. Meet japanese friends of younger son who guide us to Akakusa shops and shrine, tie notes to tree for good luck (actually, younger son's note was bad luck, which amused everyone), pose for picture with Harajuku girls, river cruise down the Sumida to garden park, more soccer, catch subway back to Akasaka. Dinner at Subway (we have really slipped, haven't we?). Have a beer in the room, watch Tokyo from 38th floor.

July 17. Breakfast at McDonalds (sorry). Yamanote Line to Ikeabura. Shoulda been Akiabara. My bad. Stop at Ueno for park and National Museum. More soccer. Talk to local guy collecting sticks about Japanese and American character. Sit on bench. Woman gives me magazine to sit on since bench is wet. Back on Yamanote line to Akeabara where I buy bigger memory chip for my camera. Lunch at place where you buy a ticket from a machine and the food cooks in front of you on a hot griddle. Cool. On to Shinagawa where we see the DaVinci Code. Not a great movie, but fun to watch a movie when you're traveling. Home to takeout from Subway.

July 18. Last day (thank goodness, you say?). Breakfast at noodle place (!), visit food court at dept store, coffee upstairs in the book store (no english section). Narita express. Fly home.

Great trip. Still a bit of a blur. Quite an adventure for us (no beaches!). Thanks again to all our advisors here (emd, KimJapan, glorialf, mrwunrfl, angethereader). So many kind japanese people, trying to help with directions, reaching out to us, asking about us. 1001 buddha. Biking. Morning pastries. Stairways to temples through cemeteries, through lines of shops. Buddha with one hand down, palm up, the other hand up, palm out. Calming (if you mimic the pose you feel better just like the song smile even though your heart is aching). Baseball cheers. The quite swooshing thumping sound the trains make. Neon. So many many people. Thick, steep, straw roofs. Carp. Japan.

Well, sorry to take off on the McD's theme, but I read every word of your report, and "I'm lovin' it!"

Glad you enjoyed the baseball game and Ghibli.

Did you find restaurants in Hakone and Takayama? Your report left me hanging there.

I like hearing about your biking in Takayama and Kyoto. But I am sorry you got lost on way to Philosopher's Path.

Beleive me, more than one person ehre will sympathise w/your confusing the names of the stops around the loop in Tokyo. I always mix up Asakusa and Akasaka (did you mean Asakusa on July 16th?). They did those names just to confuse travelers like us, right? But at least you got to stop at Uneo on the way from Ikebukuro to Akihabara.

It must have been very very hot, but you do not mention the heat too much. I sense you are "troopers" in the best sense of the word.

I think you and your kids will have lots of good memories. I know my kids and I have lots of good memories of our trips to Japan.

And sometimes getting lost is a great part of the trip. I will never forget the hour I spent being lost in Kyoto in the pouring rain w/my son, looking for a fabric place were we were going for a workshop, and watching my son, soaking wet from head to toe, swinging from the lamp post, dancing in the street, and crooning "Singin' in the Rain" to me.

Thank you so much for your report.

If you get a chance, ask your kids and tell us what they say about what things they liked most about the trip, and post back on their responses. Many people w/teens come on this site and it is good for them to hear what the kids liked.

We found restaurants in Hakone and Takayama. We liked the Hotel Fujiya (Flower Palace). We ended up in a restaurant around the corner to the left from the hotel (Baza?) which was on the second floor of a converted bank building. Good food, weak ambience. Further along the street, we discovered the next day, were two more sushi and tempora places. In Takayama we liked Suzuya, about 4 blocks from the Antique Inn. We tried to get to Agura, on the morning market side of the river, which sounds nice (variety of foods, mellow jazz soundtrack), but wasn't open for lunch.

It's hard enough for us to find hotels and museums when we travel. Finding recommended restaurants may be too much for our family.

On the 16th I actually did mean to say Akasaka. That's where out hotel was, and one of the few places I was fairly sure of. My spelling and pronunciation of most places were usually at least several syllables off.

I'll continue to try and find out what my kids liked best about the trip. My teenagers are not all that chatty when I want them to be. They say they liked Takayama. Playing soccer with the japanese teenager they met was fun. Discovering the library and the internet there was fun. I think they enjoyed a mix of what they knew and what was foreign. So eating at McDonalds in Nara and Subway in Tokyo was fun. I think they enjoyed getting a haircut and going to movies. And playing soccer (our trip coincided with the world cup). And the Akasaka Prince. And the baseball game.

I guess teenagers try to wrest some control from parents and assert their own order to life. Travel relaxes the standard order and gives both parents and their kids a chance to be pleasantly surprised. Of course unpleasantly surprised too. Even though all the signs were in english, we spent four hours coming home waiting for connections in Atlanta because we waited two hours at the wrong gate...

Great report, I've gotten about half way through and am enjoying it. Thanks for the tip, emd.

By Antique Inn I believe that you mean Sumiyoshi. Please tell us more about your experience there, if it was comfortable and if the food and service were good.

We liked the Antique Inn (Sumiyoshi). We had two open rooms on the ground floor and a small enclosed veranda with a table and two chairs looking out on a garden and the river. A bike rental shop was next door, and the morning market was an easy walk across the bridge. We had one dinner at the inn, one at a restaurant. Dinner at the inn was fun, but not fantastic. Thanks again to you, emd and other foderites for your help.

Thank you for the report. I was interested to see what your teens liked as I will be taking my 19 yr old son on a trip in October. Are your kids into music at all and if so did they find any place to check out the local music scene for kids?

ok. thank you santamonica, it was a fun read.

So, how did you like the cottage? It was cold when we were there, I would have liked to have opened the sliding doors into the garden, but brrrrrr.
I enjoyed your report very much.
The son that we traveled with (20) lives in Japan - for a year - but it was still interesting and often surprising what he was drawn to.

The cottage was great! Thanks for your suggestions to reserve early. The kids could go through the door in the wall next to the cottage to the park next door to play soccer, the place was really comfortable for the four of us, and it was fun to have bikes to explore and bring home morning pastries. I'm sorry we didn't do more music stuff. The only things we could read from posters were the dates, but consulting local entertainment guides or english newspapers would have helped. Some guides are probably on-line. We didn't even get to kareoke! Clearly, Bill Murray stayed out a lot later than we did. On the other hand, he didn't get to the Ghibli museum...

Hirota helped us out quite a bit with getting around the city. But then I have no idea what it's like when you don't have a tranlator. Evan was a godsend. The only thing he had trouble with was menus because of the descriptions and the fancy script.
However did you manage to order?

Hirota was wonderful, although maybe a tad ambitious in her planning. One day's itinerary included Nijo castle, the golden pavilian, a boat ride on the Hozu River, and commerant fishing. No wonder we didn't get to kareoke. For ordering food, the plastic food displays were very useful. I wanted to bring home a plastic blueberry parfait. We did get a little tired of miso soup.

Wow, that's a little too much in one day.
I already had tentative itineraries, so she was more of a help with those. And I overdid it on my own itineraries. I guess we end up spending more than the alloted time at each place.