Japan Journal 2024

I have always had a fascination with Japan that has only grown after my previous visits. My wife Mel has never visited so it has always been our plan that I would show her around at some point with the stars aligning that it would be this year so we pencilled in the dates and started booking. Mel has a busy dog grooming service with appointments booked up to a year in advance so this process had to start quite a long time ago with my first booking our flights back in October then hotels, then parking and attractions with our expensive one-week JR Rail (Japan Rail) pass waiting until a lot closer to departure. Logistics have been a bit tricky with our requiring reservations for most attractions even those where this is not normally required due to the time of year we are travelling…

Not only did I want to show Mel Japan but I have also always wanted to see the famous “Sakura” or “Cherry Blossom Festival” along with the related “hanami” picnics where the local people will gather together on blankets under the blossoms to enjoy the coming of spring so we decided to arrange our travel in the hope of being able to see it. I say “in the hope” because the cherry blossom trees only reach their peak bloom for 2-3 weeks and are notoriously hard to predict despite the Japanese publishing “cherry blossom forecasts” every year. When we booked our flights even this was not yet available so I had to make my “best guess” based on the dates in previous years when they came out. Thankfully, according to this year’s forecast we should be seeing them at their peak.

>> Next: Day 1