What were your favorite little spots that weren't horribly touristy that you hope other people get to see? A couple of mine are:

• Shimokitazawa - cute shopping district not far from Tokyo
• Miyajima Island - beautiful island with tame deer, easy mountain hikes, and lovely temples, off the coast of Hiroshima via ferry
• Kamakura - former capital of Japan with lots of temples, a historic electric railway that still runs antique passenger cars, and surfing at the beach. 1.5 hours south of Tokyo.

Of course a travel lock won't stand up to much abuse, but this one also doubles as a carabiner when used unlocked. $30 from Matador.

Sleep off your Kabukicho hangover on the Romancecar from Shinjuku to Hakone as you ride toward an onsen you can spend all day relaxing in. Not that I speak from experience.

• Wear a sling bag for quick access to your stuff without having to go into your big bag on the airplane.
• You probably don't need the fancy laundry soap packets to wash your clothes in the sink. You can use a little bit of laundry soap bar in a plastic bag, or in a pinch, some hand soap.
• Nice sandals (like Bedrock) and zero-drop shoes (like Lems) can pack real flat into your bag and reclaim some space.
• Bring a Heroclip, a carabiner which can double as a hook to keep your nice backpack off the bathroom floor.
• Little A6 notebooks fit almost anywhere and are a great way to jot down notes during your trip.

I try to stay minimal in terms of volume, and for me, that means ditching most redunancies when traveling with one bag. I replace the electric shaver with a simple disposable razor, and I only pack one CeraVe SPF face lotion that I use for my hands if I need it. For doing laundry in the sink, I use a cut-down bar of Zote pink soap in the Matador dry-thru soap bag.

For my dry goods, I use this Sea to Summit hanging toiletry bag which I bought for ultralight camping. This thing is super light and has plenty of great organization for being so tiny. For the 1 quart liquids bag required for airline travel, I recently upgraded from a ziploc bag to this generic, durable, clear-sided plastic bag with a zipper and handle. I attach a small carabiner and clip the handle to the hanging bag if I don't have space by the sink.

What are your favorite toiletry tips?

Hello! I'm Matt and I just booted up Globe.pub, a Lemmy instance focused on world travel. I'm trying to build a cozy and friendly home for people who used to have that sort of community on Reddit.

Right now, we have two communities:

• !japan@lemmy.globe.pub – for anything and everything relating to visiting the country of Japan
• !onebag@lemmy.globe.pub – travel light, avoid lost luggage, and move faster with one backpack, rather than a giant checked roller bag

Community creation is open – if you have a favorite destination or a specific travel-related topic, we'd love to host your conversations about the places you like to go and the ways you like to explore.

Welcome | välkommen | fáilte | ようこそ | selamat datang!

Welcome to Globe.pub, a friendly community for travelers! This is Main, our community for general travel discussion.

Please introduce yourself here – we would love to meet you! Make a post, tell us a little bit about yourself and what you like most about traveling.

Visiting a new place for the first time can be intimidating, but it’s always easier when you have help from friends. My goal is for us to build a community where travelers can give helpful advice, share their unique experiences, and learn from each other.

Rules

1. Be empathetic, welcoming, and open.
2. No racism, sexism, fascism, transphobia, or bigotry.
3. Respect other people and don’t be a jerk.
4. No political debate – keep talk on-topic for travel discussion.
5. Mark content as NSFW.
6. No spam or unsolicited promotion.

These rules are described in detail on our website. Report posts that break the rules using the 🚩 button and admins will take a look promptly.

What should I know?

Signups are open. You're welcome to make an account on Globe.pub and start posting. We're connected to other Lemmy instances and you're welcome to use your Globe.pub account on other Fediverse sites.

Community creation is open. Are you enthusiastic about a particular kind of travel or a particular area of the world? Create a community and start posting! You'll have a brand new space to attract other travelers who want to talk about your topic.

What should I post? Anything related to travel is welcome here. Here are some ideas:

• Articles about interesting destinations. Give us ideas for places to see that we haven't heard of.
• Trip reports. Tell us about your experiences traveling somewhere else. What went well, what went poorly, and what would you do differently next time? These first-hand accounts are incredibly valuable for people planning their own trips.
• Itinerary checks. Do you have a trip planned out? Share your in-depth agenda with us and we'll help you figure out what's reasonable and what you should cut.
• Questions about travel. If you're planning a trip and have questions, ask them here! We'll do our best to help you out.

Technical Details

I'm a professional infrastructure engineer running this server in my spare time with my own money. I do my best to preserve your data and keep the site running, but I'm not perfect. I do not provide any guarantees for uptime or durability. There is a chance your data may disappear at any time without warning, but I promise I'm doing my best to keep that from happening – this is my home Lemmy instance, and I want to do right by you.

This server is hosted on a dedicated bare-metal instance located in a datacenter in the US. I do not provide any particular guarantees regarding the safety of your data, and I cannot safeguard your data against, for example, search and seizure by government officials. Do not use Lemmy to share sensitive information.

If something isn't working as you expect, please email me at matt@globe.pub.

Learning a bit of Japanese over the three months before I arrived helped me out a lot and I'm so glad that I spent the effort doing so. But if you don't have the time for that, you can still have a great trip to Japan.