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Home Archive for July 2015
To climb Fuji-san, the only time you can do it is in the summer because otherwise, it will be closed. 

Usual plan to go to Fuji involve staying at the base/at the logde in the mountain. Depends on what your goal is, watch sunrise, sunset or just want to climb. 

The usual and most common plan for first time climber, if you want to see the sunrise: 
1. Get a ticket by bus (highway express) from Shinjuku station, 
2. from Tokyo go at around 3pm, it will take around 2 hours to go to Fuji 5th station(base for you to climb), 
3. Climb through Yoshida trail (yello trail), that is the easiest trail and it has a lot of lounge, huts to rest and toilets, 
4. The standard time to reach the summit is around 6 hours. The trail consist of sands, rocks and uneven surface. If you clinb at night, be sure to bring headlamp with you since you will need your hand to crawl the rocky trail. (Seriously, I feel like Frodo Baggins who tries to climb Mount Doom).

See what I'm sayin'?



5. Bring winter clothes if you climb at night, even when you are climbing at daylight, you could never tell the weather. Bring light jacket, wind stopper, rain coat with you. The top of Fuji-san could be very cold, when I was there in July, I saw snow on the top of the mountain. 
6. The descend route is faster, it requires around 3 hours to descend. Its mostly consisted of sand, and just be careful on your way down. If you descend at night, you may require more time since you will be exhausted. 
7. You could take 9am or 10 an or 11 am or 3 pm or whatever time convenient for you by bus to go back to Shinjuku. 


Shinjyuku, 
7/27/2015


resources:
http://www.garyjwolff.com/climbing-mt-fuji.html
Japan or rather, Tokyo and lines. Omg.

Ok so these are the unwritten rules in train and stations. 

First: make lines when you are waiting for the train. You can see the place of platform on the floor. Like the photo below. Ok, find those and make line there. The train door will open exactly at where you stand. Fail to follow this, you will find yourself ..... Alone in where you stand while therewould be long line next to you ( like just what I did today. I saw the wrong sign and wonder why nobody id behind me. Do they hate me? Nope lol)

Second: in the elevator, if there is space for two people, in Tokyo, if you want to stop n not walk in the elevator, stand on the left sude. In Oosaka, on the right side. The other side of the standing lane is for those who wants to walk. 

Third: when climbing the stairs/ descend from the stairs, there should be arrows indicating to which side of the stairs you should be at. If you are going up for instance, glance at the upward arrow or  のぼる。if you are going down the stairs, then glance (quickly) where the doenward arrow. Or maybe its easier to follow the crowd. 

Ikebukuro st. Tokyo. Japan
7/23/2105





If you are going to use a lot of railways in Tokyo, I highly recommend you to buy the card, I am not sure the difference between Pasmo and Suica but they roughly similar. If you would like, you could read my previous post about the cards.

Noted if you are going to travel not only in Tokyo, but also Kyoto, Osaka, Nara, Fukuoka and other further places in Japan, I suggest you to buy JR Pass. JR Pass will allow you to travel far distance with relatively cheaper price rather than when you buy it on the spot one ticket at a time. Its only worth it when you used it at least for a round trip from tokyo-osaka, for instance. Notice that it could only be ordered outside of Japan (order it from your country) and then claim it at Narita/stations (the stations are mentioned in the ticket). There are JR pass for 7 days or 14 days (and maybe more, I am not sure). There are two types, the green one and the usual one. Both can't be used for Nozomi and Hikari Shinkansen.

The price for 7 days is around 30000yen with tax and for 14 days is around 40.000 yen with tax. There should be a representative  JR ticket office in your country. In US: http://www.japanrailpass.net/sphone/en/about_jrp.html and in Indonesia:. http://railpass-japan.com. The ticket can be ordered online and mailed to your address (How I miss US for this ease, I can do it in Indonesia as well but I dont really trust the system haha). 

However you can also get it from any travel agent, they also sell it usually. There are some eligibility to buy the pass: you should have foreign passport, buy it in 3 months begore your journey & some other eligibilities. Please check it out before you buy it. 


Hibarigaoka station, Tokyo, Japan.
Morning commute with a lot of people inside the train. With that station master/whoever 's push people so they can fit in the train and the train door could be closed. Its real. Omg. what an experience.

7/22/2015

Nikko is not actully located in Tokyo, but in Tochigi. There is a famous temple for Tokugawa Ieyasu that was built by his grandson which also had temple exactly next to Toshōgu, the temple for Tokugawa Ieyasu.

The temple is very beautiful, very elegant with enourmous decoration; sculpture, detailed wood carving and architecture.


The famous hear no evil, speak no evil and see no evil monkey sculpture.

The five story pagoda




How to go there:
Your destionation for Toshogu is Tobu-Nikko train. There is a train bound for Tobu Nikko from Kita senju or the train towards Tokyo Skytree. 

Note that in the Tobu Nikko train, there is a train that need you to change platform because train car 1-4 will go to onsen while the one that goes to Toshogu will be in 3/4-6 train car. 

Afterward you can walk from the station to the temple or you can take the bus. 

Entrance fee is (damn I forget)

8/8/2015
Depok, Indonesia



In your trip in Tokyo, train will be your best buddy. Its cheap, fast, on time and dependable. If you are going to spend more than 1 week in Tokyo by train, you will need a card either Suica or Pasmo card. They could be used to go to any train, despite of different lines (Odakyu, Seibu, JR, etc)  or types (Tokyo metro subway or usual train). I shall describe the trains in Tokyo in other post. These cards even could be used like a debit card, to buy drinks/food in the station. In my trip in Tokyo, I used Suica. I dont think there is any big difference between Suica and Pasmo though.

Firstly
How to get the card: go find this pink booth in the station. The writing in the booth should be 'Buy new Suica/Pasmo card'. In every big station such as Tokyo station, Shibuya, Shinjuku, Ikebukuro, Akihabara, I think there should be one. I don't know if its available in Narita/Haneda too. It maybe is. 

The booth to buy the suica card

the interface

Choose the English menu, click on purchase new suica and follow the instruction. Then enter the money (usually the thousands: 1000, 2000,5000 or 10000) to the machine. The deposited money will be reduced each time you used it. The charge for each trip depends on how far is your journey. 

Tips: if you know that you'll be using same route for a long time, a month for instance, then you can also set it up at the destination/start of journey station. Sorry for this one I got my wonderful friend help me so, I don't know much. 

You can see the fee for trains when you use googlemap/navitime. 

If you only need to take once or twice, then you could use one time ticket. What you need to do is firstly you need to see the map, look for your current station location and your destination station. Then there should be fee written there. For this option, choose 'ticket' and insert the amount of money you need to go there, and then you will get a paper ticket. When you first come to the station entrance (make sure you enter the right entrance gate), and then put the card inside the machine, and don't forget to take it. The ticket will have a hole, like a punched hole, and you will need it to get out at the destination station. I find this wikihow on how to take trains in Tokyo is quite explaining.

Have a good trip! 


Pla
Ikebukuro station, 2015. 



During my travel, I usually need internet for navigation: for googlemap for example and also to contact my friend.

Luckily, my friend told me that it is cheaper and easier to get a simcard for traveller in japan. There are several option
1. Rent portable wifi such as PuPuRu or econnect
2. Buy phone ( I think its kind of difficult to buy phone if you're on tourist visa)
3. Buy simcard for your phone : could be offline or by econnect too.

I opt for buying a simcard. I bought the simcard in Bic Camera (in Shinjuku, but its also available in Shibuya, and several other big places).

The simcard that I use is only for internet connection, meaning no text or call, but that is sufficient for me since I could use Whatsapp or Line to call or send messages. The quota could be use up to 3 months for 2 GB. That is enough for me as I use it heavily for google map and Line. Other thing that I use are slight browsing, open fb or instagram. For two weeks, I used 500Mb, so I think its a good way to get internet in Japan if you are going to be for a week or more.

There are several other option too beside the 3 months 2GB. For you who wants to travel in relatively shorter time, such as 1 week.

The details for this particular simcard could be seen here in the brastel website
Note though, when I wanted to use it, I need to download particular profile in the cellular data. Iphone and Android has slight difference when it comes to the setting to make it work. 


The simcard package
Dont forget to use the simcard that suitable for your phone. Mine is iPhone 5s so it needs microsim. The price is around 4903 yen after tax. 

Hope it helps! 

Shinjuku,  Japan
July 20, 2015.

Plaupla


Shinjuku is one of the biggest station in Tokyo, roughly serving around 2 million passanger everyday, its is very busy. Added by the sheer number of exit in Shinjuku station, one could get lost easily (I did). In Japan, pay attention to which exit you should take. You could end up in completely different road/buidling you originally intend to. Also, the position of the train that you take will definitely take you to different exit.

For instance, I wanted to go to West Exit so I can go to my language school in Nishishinjuku, but since I came from Seibu-Ikebukuro Line, I tend to get the JR Yamanote Line on the middle to last car (train car 9/10) because that is the nearest car from Ikebukuro. But since I take the last car, when I arrived in Shinjuku the nearest exit is south exit. South Exit will take me to Odakyu hotel. Which is very far from where I wanted to go. So what I supposed to take is the front cars from Seibu-Ikebukuro, and take the middle car (6-8) so I can get out in the right platform which is closest with the exit I want (west exit). You might find this confusing but, wait until you are there, experience it yourself (lol).

The volume of people in the rush hour in the morning is just crazy, its really like the sea of people. So the people usually already know what car they should be in to get to the nearest exit to their destination. Otherwise, it will be difficult. There are guide in English, of course, but the rushy work people won't let you stay hesitate to figure out where you should go to. You better ready and prepared and know where you want to walk. If you are going to Shinjuku for a tourism trip, then I suggest you to come before or after the rush hour.

There are several exit station in Shinjuku.
Central, West, East, North, South exit. These are located under different massive department store: Odakyu, Keio, Lumine,etc.
Shinjuku Station Map (from Odakyu website).
Pay attention where your arrival station and your transfer station/your exit destination

If you lost, don't worry, even Japanese native would not know how to navigate in the Shinjuku station unless they walked there every day. So you're not alone. But here, if you will live/stay around Shinjuku, here is some guide that I think quite helpful from Odakyu about Shinjuku underground.

Most of the big station in Tokyo located under department store. Moreover, sometime it serves as transfer station to other line. JR Line, Metro Line and other lines are served by different companies but they could be paid by same card (suica or pasmo in Tokyo. Other city has different card, Osaka for instance use Icoca).

Shinjuku station in the morning

Have a nice trip!

Plaupla
Shinjuku. July 13, 2015.




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About this blog

This blog is written by Ulfa. She is a traveler, amateur photographer and has fallen in love with Japan for a very long time. She would like to share her travel tips in this blog. Terra Travella meant to share information and experiences about places that she loves and had visited.

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