Japan by Caravan
Japan by Caravan
Renting a caravan in Japan and traveling part of the country in it was our best travel idea so far. Japan and a caravan are great ideas on their own, but we have two kids (1.5 and 6 years old), and the thought of moving between cities not in the comfort of a car, of staying in a different city and hotel every few days, and being dependent only on public transport and where our feet take us (our youngest son wouldn't get far), didn't really appeal to us. Not to mention the cost of hotels.
Article Contents
How to rent a caravan in Japan
Can you sleep in the wild in Japan?
Where to sleep with a caravan in Japan
Our road trip across Japan
How much does caravan travel in Japan cost
Why discover Japan by caravan
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How to rent a caravan in Japan
We had a caravan – our little house on wheels – and the world was our front yard. Apart from Tokyo, where we flew in and rented the car, we skipped the big cities and swapped them for nature and small towns. But let's start from the beginning.
We got the caravan from Japan Campers, costing us approximately 2,900 CZK per night in conversion, and we had it for 23 days. You drive on the left, everything is the opposite, and I recommend spending the first few kilometers as far from Tokyo as possible. Don't forget your international driver's license – without it, you literally can't move.
Can you sleep in the wild in Japan?
Yes, you can. Not everywhere, but designated parking lots called Michi no eki serve for car sleeping, among other things. Next to them, there's always a toilet, a store, and sometimes an onsen. In small towns, it's the main stop for drivers, where they find everything they need.
How we found places to sleep
We searched for sleeping spots through a Japanese page that lists sleep locations, similar to our Park4night. However, because it resembles Wikipedia in both visuals and the amount of information, and it's in Japanese, my husband coded it into a more understandable version for us. We also received a map from Japan Campers and Park4night partially worked. The combination of the three maps and my husband's patience always led us to free places to sleep – a bit from the beach, at a forest parking lot, or on the town's edge. The disadvantages of wild parking in Japanese nature include bears, boars, and monkeys, of which there are many in the forests. During our entire time, we didn't encounter any of them, yet we sometimes slept in places where after dusk, we exited the car loudly and with great respect.
How life in a caravan works in Japan
With toilets and water, it's very simple in Japan – they're almost everywhere freely accessible. Handling waste is worse; that's a chapter of its own. By European standards, an enormous amount of plastic waste arises in everyday life there. Everything is packaged, ideally with 'a bag in a bag'. In konbini (7-Eleven, FamilyMart, and Lawson), which will become your main kitchen for some time, you'll find almost nothing without packaging. Combined with very few places to dispose of waste, it's almost grotesque. In Japan, waste is the responsibility of the individual – everyone takes it home, washes it, dries it, and sorts it carefully. But what if you have no home bin? Occasionally, with bags full of garbage in the trunk, we felt like a garbage truck. And from time to time, albeit illegally, we discarded it into waste nets intended for local household waste.
Another chapter is the Onsens, or public baths, of which there are plenty in Japan, and if you don't have tattoos (entry with them is strictly prohibited in most Onsens due to the Yakuza and tattoos association), the absence of a shower in the car becomes irrelevant. Hot springs and all-embracing nudity are, after all, way better than any shower.
You'll often encounter laundromats and large washer-dryers where you can wash and dry 15 kg of laundry for 1,000¥ per hour.
Our slow journey across Japan
Traveling by car through Japan is slow. If your dream is to travel the country slowly, you'll achieve that perfectly there. We originally planned to reach Shikoku, then go north, and back to Tokyo through Kyoto. After finding out that outside highways, you drive at a maximum of 50 km/h (often just 30 km/h according to the type of road) in Japan, and after realistically considering how many hours we'd spend in the car daily, we shortened the circuit. We chose the Japanese Alps, Kiso Valley, through the most beautiful villages to the north to Himi and back through another valley – the one around the monkeys – to Tokyo.
We didn't experience many camps; in April, most were still closed (the main season is from May to October), but those open were real oases. Besides paid camps, we also came across unpaid ones, for example, Kisokoma Reisui Park. While sitting in front of the caravan, I wrote this article – if you want to get the atmosphere firsthand, it's still 'fresh'. Japanese camping often resembled more glamping: huge trunks full of clothes, low beds in tents, sometimes even full-fledged tables, remote offices, kitchen equipment that would make our Prague kitchen envious, and endless grilling. The Japanese know how to camp!
Why try Japan by caravan
Even in a parking lot, they typically pull out chairs or a small table. An unwritten rule here is that while you can sleep, everything (even shoes) stays in the car. Here, it's not rudeness; here, it's allowed. They don't do it on a large scale but do it in the back cover of the car, so as not to block the spaces to the right or left. It's more like leaving a bag behind to wait in line or placing a hat to reserve a spot at a restaurant table. It's a quieter, considerate 'pause' rather than breaking any rules.
Camping in Japan is possible, common, safe, and if you want to immerse yourself more in nature than cities for a while, I recommend it. You only need time, an international driver's license, and the courage to drive on the left.
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