Japan on your own
Behind bullet-train Japan hides a country of immaculate mountain roads, roadside stations with hot springs and countryside the classic circuits never see: the unexpected paradise of travel behind the wheel.
When to go
Two royal windows: the sakura (late March-April, depending on latitude) and the red maples of koyo (October-November). Avoid Golden Week (late April-early May, the whole of Japan on the road) and the tsuyu rainy season (June to mid-July, except Hokkaido, which escapes it). Summer is hot, humid and typhoon-prone (August-September, especially Okinawa and Kyushu) — but it is THE season for Hokkaido, with Furano's lavender in July. Winter driving is for the equipped: snow tyres compulsory in the north.
What it costs
With the yen weak, road-trip Japan is reasonable: compact car €40-70/day, campervan €80-130/day (Japan Campers, Rental Camper), petrol around €1.10/L. The real hidden cost: tolls, which are ferocious (Tokyo-Kyoto ~€65) — hence the visitor-only unlimited passes (Hokkaido Expressway Pass, Kyushu Expressway Pass). Nights: business hotel €50-90, ryokan with dinner €120-250, michi-no-eki free in a van. Budget €2,500-4,000 for two over 15 days excluding flights, mixing styles.
Driving & transport
Left-hand driving, and an administrative rule that traps travellers every year: the 1949-model International Driving Permit is NOT recognised for French, Swiss or Belgian licences — you need the official JAF translation (about €25, online or in person, allow a few days). Rent the ETC card with the vehicle to sail through tolls. Local traps: stop lines marked 止まれ on the tarmac, an absolute ban on turning at a red light, zero-tolerance alcohol (0.0 g — the passenger who lent the car is guilty too), and urban lanes narrower than your wing mirror. Rental GPS units accept a destination's phone number instead of its address: far more reliable.
Japan by car is a well-kept secret: beyond the megacities, the country becomes a network of perfect roads winding between volcanoes, rice paddies and timber villages, punctuated by more than 1,200 michi-no-eki — roadside stations unique in the world, offering farm produce, hot baths and tolerated overnight parking. Hokkaido by van in summer, Kyushu's Yamanami Highway, the gorges of Shikoku: roads that rival the world's finest, in disconcerting safety and cleanliness.
The right formula is almost always hybrid: the train to swallow Tokyo-Kyoto and the long hauls, a regionally rented car where it changes everything — Hokkaido, the Alps, Kyushu, Shikoku, Okinawa. You drive on the left, slowly (a real 60 km/h off the expressways), with a rented ETC card for the tolls and a politeness behind the wheel that rubs off fast. One crucial detail for many Europeans: an International Driving Permit isn't always enough — French, Swiss and Belgian licences need the official JAF translation instead.
The destinations that matter
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No. 016 to 10 nightsHokkaido by vanLavender fields to the horizon, straight roads between the volcanoes and a roadside station with a hot spring every 30 km: Hokkaido is the great island of Japanese van life.No. 023 to 4 nightsJapanese AlpsPeaks at 3,000 m, a turquoise river beneath the birches, carpenters' villages and thatched farmhouses: alpine Japan drives like a dream — right up to the Kamikochi barriers.No. 035 to 7 nightsVolcanic KyushuOne of the world's largest inhabited calderas, a ridge road between the fumaroles and a volcano dusting ash on the umbrellas of Kagoshima: Kyushu is the great geothermal south.No. 045 to 8 nightsShikoku and the 88 Temple RouteA 1,200-kilometre pilgrimage around an island the circuits forgot, vine bridges over emerald gorges and empty coastal roads: Shikoku is the Japan of before, open to anyone who takes the wheel.No. 054 to 6 nightsOkinawaA subtropical archipelago halfway to Taiwan, bridges skimming a turquoise lagoon and a culture that is only half Japanese: Okinawa is another country — and it can only be explored by car.No. 062 to 3 nightsMount Fuji and the Five LakesThe perfect cone must be earned: it's by car, along the five lakes and on the ridge roads of Hakone, that Fuji lets itself be framed — ideally on a winter morning, before the clouds climb.
Our flagship guide — €29
Guide available“Japan on Your Own”, the complete edition, is out
10 chapters: day-by-day itineraries, driving and transport, a costed budget and checklists — the same method as our Namibia guide.
The guide is currently written in French — an English edition is in the works.
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