- Speaker #0
Like, you know, people would walk, who knows how many kilometers, 40 kilometers, 50 kilometers, maybe in a day. And the whole distance of this is roughly around 500 kilometers. There's different measurements, but generally people say 500 kilometers, roughly around 300 miles. There's these 53 woodblock prints. And, you know, if you look it up, it'll pop up right away on Wikipedia. But the beginning is considered Tokyo, Edo at the time, Nippon Dashi, this bridge. in Tokyo, right by Tokyo Station. And then you have the 53 stations, the post towns. And then the last, the end point is this bridge in Kyoto called Sanjo Ohashi, the bridge on Third Avenue, I guess you could translate it. I did it backwards in that sense in that I started at the bridge in Kyoto and walked all the way to the bridge in Tokyo.
- Speaker #1
Welcome to the Wing and It Travel podcast with me, James Hammond. Every Monday I'll be joined by guests to talk about their travel stories, travel tips, backpacking advice and so much more. Are you a backpacker, gap year student or simply someone who loves to travel? Then this is the podcast for you, designed to inspire you to travel. There'll be stories to tell, tips to share and experiences to inspire. Welcome to the show. Hello and welcome to this week's episode. I'm joined by Tony Dotvega. a legally blind content creator who focuses on Japanese content. And Tony has a website called Japankyo.com, that's K-Y-O. Today we're going to talk about Tony walking across Japan from Kyoto to Tyoko, along the historic Takaido Road, which took about 29 days and covered around 500 kilometers. Tony also has a YouTube documentary covering this journey, and he's now planning to walk the Kyoto to Hiroshima Trail, which is going to be super exciting. Tony, welcome to the show. How are you doing?
- Speaker #0
Great. Great to be here. And thank you for having me on the show, Jake.
- Speaker #1
No, no worries. Really looking forward to it. Can you tell the listeners where you're based right now?
- Speaker #0
Yeah, sure. So I live in Hawaii. I've been here for 10 years. Aside from that, I've been like on the east coast of the US, several years in Japan. Yeah, based in Hawaii at the moment, in Honolulu specifically.
- Speaker #1
Wow. And what's the reason for Hawaii? Well,
- Speaker #0
I came here after living in Japan for a while. I came here to attend the University of Hawaii's master's degree in Japanese language and linguistics. So a super nerdy and rare master's degree program. There are not a lot of those in the world. Hawaii seemed like a wonderful place with a lot of connections to Japan. And I got accepted. So I came here and I stayed ever since.
- Speaker #1
I got some questions about Hawaii life because I went there a long time ago now. I was 14, so I had to leave Australia after my visa. And I thought, where's good to go? Let's go Hawaii. It's in the middle of nowhere. And I loved my time there. Very expensive. It wasn't the prices that I was expecting. Yeah, tell me about Hawaii. What's great there? Why are you living there? And also, what are the best islands in your view to go and see?
- Speaker #0
Sure, sure, sure. So Hawaii, I mean, it goes without saying. I mean, it's a beautiful place. Very unique. I mean, I think it is technically the most remote. Like, you know. place on earth in terms of like, you know, distance from the continental, like, you know, US and all that and everything around it, but great place, but crazy expensive. The rent is expensive. Food is expensive. So that, that is the unfortunate part of living here. It's the price of living in paradise. Right. But, um, you know, like for me personally, like I said, I came because of that connection with Japan and there is a lot of people of Japanese ancestry here. There's also a lot of recent Japanese immigrants from Japan. There's great Japanese food as well, because there's a lot of people from Japan that come here. They open up shop. And so there's no problem with finding good Japanese food here. And I go back to Japan at least once or twice a year. So it's a great place because it's like the closest I could be there pretty much while still being in like the 50 states of the US. So for me, that's worked out great. And I'm glad I'm here. Yeah, it is an expensive place. So, but if you're coming to visit, of course, Oahu is wonderful. And that's kind of the city, the population center. But like Maui, there's some beautiful places in Maui. I've been able to go there. You know, there's just wonderful hiking trails. And then of course, there's the big island, which is, you know, obviously it's the big island. It's the biggest one. There's the active volcano over there. But there's just a variety of ecosystems. You know, there's the... more desert like areas is the rainforest forest type areas. There's the coast. And if you're into water sports, all that surfing, just of course, beautiful, beautiful place.
- Speaker #1
And for me, I thought all three of those islands, I think you mentioned Maori, the big islands and a lot of very, very different. And my take on them is they all have their good parts, right? In unique parts, which I did love. But I would say I'm not sure what you think now, but the locals, what are they thinking about tourism right now? Because you do read some stuff that they're not too, what's the word? Not as happy, we're not too happy that there's too many tourists coming over.
- Speaker #0
I agree. I mean, that is always a concern. And of course, there is the history here, which is problematic with the U.S. coming in and taking over and all that. And the local Hawaiian population suffering because of that. There is a history here that you have to be aware of and respectful about. But the problem as well is that Hawaii is so tourist dependent. Like during the pandemic, it was a huge, huge blow to the economy. And it's still, I don't think it's recovered. There's a lot more population like coming back in terms of tourists. Like when I go to Waikiki every once in a while or to the more touristy areas, like I've noticed a significant increase in people from. Obviously, when things were starting to open back up just a couple of years ago. But for example, Japan was one of the biggest demographics of people that would come to Hawaii. That population has not increased at the same numbers that it was before the pandemic. Part of that, of course, the yen is quite cheap right now. And so it makes it even more expensive for people to come here. But I think, yeah, tourism has probably not bounced back to where it was pre-pandemic. And. That is a problem because a lot of people here, they make their living from that, right? So it's this tricky situation where too much can be concerning for the nature and erosion and pollution and things like that. But at the same time, the economy is so dependent on tourism that when something like that, when tourism goes down, a lot of people may lose their jobs and things like that that happened in the past few years. So it's this push and pull. It's a really tricky thing.
- Speaker #1
Yeah, it's a tough one, that, isn't it? I don't know how you resolve it.
- Speaker #0
Yeah.
- Speaker #1
Yeah. It's kind of what, if there's a plan B, if there's another industry that can maybe take it over, then it's fine, isn't it? But if that's the main industry that most of the locals get their money and income from, then I don't know what you can do, but welcome tourists back.
- Speaker #0
It really is. For example, like West Oahu, which is a different campus of the university of Hawaii. I think they, they're going to be opening up like a film and like production school. They've invested a lot in that. So it seems that there's awareness of investing into technology and bringing up new industries. But those are very like long term kind of things, right? Like Hawaii is a very popular place for people to come and shoot, you know, films and all that. But yeah, like it's still tourism is just overwhelmingly like the main industry. So unless there's like other income sources coming in, like people are just really dependent on that.
- Speaker #1
Yeah, it's an interesting one. Okay. And one final thing for the main island where you are right now i went to lanakai beach right yeah um is that a touristy place or is that more of a local beach because i got i think i can remember got told to go there because of waikiki is obviously very touristy right so get a bus the other side of the island go and see that you won't regret it so i went over there and i couldn't believe what i was seeing it's amazing yeah
- Speaker #0
yeah yeah i mean lanikai it's definitely i i think many people say you got to go there um and i agree look waikiki is Usually most people will stay in that area. The closest, most convenient and famous beach is Waikiki. It's nothing wrong with it, but it can be quite crowded. Lanikai is a bit more out of the way. It's in Kailua. And you do have to, whether it's you hop on a bus or you take an Uber, whatever it is, however you get there, you do have to go a little bit out of the way of like the main, main place where most people are. So there's going to be less people over there and there's less hotels and all that in that area. So it's a little bit more. How can I put it? I wouldn't say off the beaten path because it is quite well known, but it's definitely not like most people, if they're only going to go to one place, it's probably going to be Waikiki. But I do recommend checking out the other beaches because it's just a different side of the island, maybe less people and just a different vibe because like Kailua is just more of a small town kind of vibe as opposed to Waikiki, which is like the tourist place.
- Speaker #1
Yeah, I had a nightmare there. I went to go and hike a viewpoint and I got to the top. And as I got to the top, one of my flip-flops broke. I was like, oh, crap. I've got to walk back down on the stones and barefoot. And I hobbled down the trail and I found this shop, unbelievable shop, like just by Lanakai Beach that sell flip-flops. They sold this pair called Sand UK. It's not an endorsement, but they are because they're great. And I bought them and I couldn't believe what I was buying. They're like yoga mat material. And I've had them ever since. And it wasn't because my foot was hurting. I don't think. I think it's just because they felt so great. So my memory is amazing beach. the water sort of goes into the backyards of like houses on the beach is incredible less touristy you're right and my flip-flop broke and i bought some brand new ones that's all i remember yeah i assume you might have gone on the pillbox hike i think that's yes yeah yeah it's popular one in that area
- Speaker #0
yeah yeah yeah yeah great views definitely yeah
- Speaker #1
Okay, I'd like to delve a little bit back into the travel background of yourself and most of my guests. Where did you initially grow up and was there any memories of travel growing up as well?
- Speaker #0
Sure. So I was born in New York and I was there until I was about 10 and then moved to Peru because my family is originally from Peru. I spent like about a year and a half, two years there and then we moved to Florida. And that's where I spent like my kind of teen years into university. And then I started going to Japan. Like for me, like moving around happened, but it wasn't so much like a travel thing in the early years. It was like we go to Peru like every summer. So that was just like normal for me. And then, you know, once I got to university, then I started going to Japan on my own. And that's like I kind of kept going back there. So in later years, I started going to other countries. But like growing up, it was mainly like, OK, you know, our family's in Peru. So let's go to Peru. And then once I had the...
- Speaker #1
actual resources to go start going by myself like i want to go to japan like that's the thing that's the place i've always wanted to go to and so i started going there on my own and was there like an interest in travel or just it's just something that you like doing or was there like a burning desire to go and see different cultures or different countries so
- Speaker #0
i think like the the interest in travel started developing um through my interest in japan so i i started to go to japan and then from there like oh it was like you know what there's actually cheap flights to taiwan um and i went to taiwan you know and then eventually started going i went to korea as well um and and you know unfortunately i haven't had the chance to go to that many countries yet but like i really want to uh it's just like now with the content creation kind of aspect of like that's what i've made my career into like i'm kind of focusing on japan and a little bit on hawaii as well at the moment but as hopefully as i continue to grow i can kind of expand out more areas because i i really really want to do that i have friends in like australia um and a few other places as well singapore and i'm like they keep telling me come come come like i i need to do that i tell you what we need to come to hawaii yeah we can do an episode there that'd be great but you're right we'll come to that in a bit about youtube about content creation because i've got some questions and i think i'm trying to yeah
- Speaker #1
deep down trying to go to that area as well right so i'm trying to build my youtube stuff like we'll come to that in a second i want to touch on that i mentioned in the intro that you're legally blind you which was, I guess, confirmed in 2003 at the age of 18. Exactly, yeah. What does that actually mean? And maybe tell me maybe a little bit about your eyesight, about what you can and can't see, or what the, like, for a layman's person like me, who probably has decent, all right, website, eyesight, sorry.
- Speaker #0
Yeah, yeah, yeah, no problem. So legally blind, it's like, it's actually a legal term, you know, like according to the law, there's a certain, you know, level that then you're considered blind. But basically there's a lot of terms, either partially blind or low vision. And, and. there's a spectrum, right? Like every person sees a little bit different, completely sighted to like people with glasses to completely blind and everything in between. In my case, I have essentially no usable, basically no central vision. So I can see the sides and the bottom. And what that means in practical terms is like, I can't see regular size text. I have to use magnification on the computer, for example, to like read emails and stuff like that. But if Because magnification takes so long to read something, if it's anything of any decent length, I use text to speech. Okay. And like, for example, on the street, if somebody's just walking by me, I can't see their face, right? Like, unless they're like right up on me, I can't recognize people visually. Like street signs, I can't see that. Like if stairs, a lot of times, you know, stairs do have a bit of contrast on them. I think there's an awareness that people, you know, that is helpful to people, but some stairs don't. And sometimes those catch me by surprise. But like I have a white cane that I use when I'm walking around outside. I can see well enough to walk without one, especially like in places that I'm familiar with. But if I'm walking around outside, it's just safer because I may not see people coming at me on a bicycle and things like that. I got to let people around me know that I can't see that. So I do use a white cane to navigate a little bit, but also just to let people know outside that, hey, I can't see you walking at me. So, yeah, I'm... I'm... Very blind, but not completely blind. I still have usable vision in some regard. It's tricky, but that's why I kind of have to explain what I can't see.
- Speaker #1
It's really hard to imagine, isn't it? It is.
- Speaker #0
I was completely sighted. I didn't use glasses or anything. I was driving. I was, you know, Chinese and Japanese movies with subtitles and all that. And then, you know, within the matter of like maybe a month. Like I went from totally normal sighted to basically I couldn't drive anymore. And it was very sudden and a complete like at the beginning, doctors didn't know exactly what it was. It took a while for one specific like neuro ophthalmologist to like say, oh, I know what you have. And apparently it's quite rare. So, yeah, there was quite a transition period. It was it was not easy. But eventually, you know, little by little, I started to realize like, hey, there's still stuff that I can do. And those things that I wanted to do, like they're still possible if I may have to do it a little bit of a different way. But. there's things that I still can do.
- Speaker #1
That was actually my next question. Was it gradual or instant? But it sounds like it's pretty instant.
- Speaker #0
It was and it started in one eye and expanding, expanding, started in the other eye then. And yeah, like the first doctor said, like, it's probably just stress because it's like, you know, like graduation and all that. And it's like, okay, so I got glasses. They didn't really help. And then, like I said, after like maybe two more doctors, it was the last one that figured it out. Yeah, there's no treatment at the moment. It's the optic nerve. Part of the optic nerve died. So it's been, I guess, more than 20 years now. And it's been pretty stable. Thankfully, it has been. And I'm still able to do things the way that I've been doing them for the past 20 years. And I've dealt with it. And I've been able to accomplish a lot despite that. But yeah, at the beginning, it was a sharp transition, so to speak. And there was a lot of... There was a long period where I was thinking like, I'm never going to be able to go to Japan. I'm like, you know, I can't do this. I can't do that. And I was, it was kind of like a dark period. But yeah, eventually, like the kind of like desire to go to Japan kind of started to make like, well, maybe I'll give it a shot. Maybe I'll give it a shot. And little by little, I started realizing like, hey, you know, I think I can do this. And yeah, you know, I've done quite a few things since then.
- Speaker #1
That brings us nicely into Japan. But amazing, by the way, that you've adapted. I mean, that's incredible. in terms of i think we talk a lot about situations and they're not as bad as you think but like that is quite a big life-changing thing isn't it where you're just going from seeing normally to that vision just kind of deteriorating a little bit it's like oh wow you do normally probably think your own mind oh it's temporary right it'll pass by but i guess you have that period of it'll pass by wouldn't it and then yeah you start to realize oh maybe it's actually staying and i guess that's when your third doctor came in and confirmed it and stuff and i guess that's a bit of clarity thing clarity then, then you can start to formulate plans about how to deal with it and how to move on. Right.
- Speaker #0
Yeah. Yeah. It's, it's acceptance is the trickiest thing, right? Like, cause for a long time ago, like, well, maybe, maybe there'll be some treatment that, you know, we'll fix this and this and that. And it's like, and maybe there will be like, you know, I don't know, 10 years from now, I don't know, but I can't focus on that. Right. It's like, what, what do I want to do now? And what do I need to do to accomplish that? That's eventually like the kind of thinking that I started. doing right because like for a long time it's like i loved cars i wasn't able to drive anymore i loved anime and foreign movies my japanese was not anywhere near good enough to enjoy it without subtitles and then all of a sudden like i couldn't see the subtitles so like a lot of the things that i enjoyed i loved video games couldn't really play video games anymore like so many things that i enjoyed i just couldn't enjoy them in that same way anymore but at the same time that ended up being a little bit of that push that made me like learn the language Japanese and made me like kind of challenge myself or maybe I would have been too lazy to do that otherwise.
- Speaker #1
Well, yeah, so that's hindsight, isn't it? About what you would have been like without it. Yeah, yeah. It's interesting. So that the only thing I can relate to is I had an aggressive infection, migraine, right? So I happened over two days instantly and I was like, oh, what is this? And like the pain was unbelievable, like beyond anything I've experienced. And it took 10 doctors to figure it out. And eventually there was a. there was a cure for that but at the time you're thinking i have to sign these forms like hip hip operation hip replacement i'm like bloody i'm only 24 25 26 okay yeah better sign that form you're out of it you've got morphine on tap and if you know you're in trouble a little bit when you've got like doctors and nurses around you around your bed and they're all discussing like oh why is it like five six seven eight people just like talking and asking me questions all the time you know you're a little bit of a mystery there but i think they got through it but yeah there were like four or five weeks of oh crikey is Is travel going to be possible again? Can I walk? Like they do run for your mind.
- Speaker #0
Yeah. Yeah. It's, you know, those uncertain times, right? That's really scary. And your mind starts to go everywhere. And like all those plans you had, like, well, am I going to be able to do that still? Right. But, you know, sometimes it gets really bad, but I think a lot of times, like you mentioned, there are still ways, like it's not, it may not be as bad as, you know, you start to go down those like spirals, right? A lot of times there are things that you can do to deal with that. thankfully like for you it worked out and for me you know i've found ways to deal with like the limitations that have come with this and you know i'm doing okay yeah you're doing great we should now lead on to japan and the amount of stuff you've achieved there is incredible but first of all i want to kick off with where
- Speaker #1
was your interest in japan do you know why is it just their culture was it the gaming aspect like what was your thinking there so i think so i i grew up in a time where i think you know a lot of people like
- Speaker #0
let's just say even today, like anime has become so like prevalent, but like, even like in the, in the nineties, like it was like Nintendo, right. And then anime was starting to like, get that traction, you know, Dragon Ball Z and all that stuff. But also I like in Peru, like anime was being broadcast on TV, dubbed in Spanish and like. I wasn't even really fully aware like some of that stuff was from Japan at the time. I kind of started figuring out little by little. So I think like I grew up kind of absorbing this stuff. And then the more that I realized like, oh, wait, this is from Japan. This is from Japan. I actually have like cousins that are half Japanese that are in Peru and Japan. I realized that too. So a lot of these things just started coming together. And then in high school, I had the, well, in junior high, I decided I'm going to buy a book. And like I started kind of studying the language a little bit. didn't really learn much because I was like, I don't know, like 13 years old and you're not going to learn much. But then in high school, like there was a Japanese class. And I said like, you know what? I already know Spanish because I grew up speaking Spanish. And I have to take two years of a language. And Japanese just happened to be there. In Miami, Florida, there's not a lot of schools that offer Japanese. This was very rare. But it just happened to be that that one had this like, he was an older Taiwanese gentleman. He had some crazy stories about growing up. He was such a character. But he was teaching Japanese and just, just my luck, right? Like I was kind of thing. And, and I didn't want to take Spanish or some romance language that was kind of like Spanish though. It's like, okay, I'll, I'll choose Japanese. I didn't learn that much. It was kind of like a disorderly class. Like there's a lot of slackers in that class, but I enjoyed it. And then finally, when I got into university, I started taking it more seriously. And, and then the eyesight thing happened and I was still taking Japanese. Like when, when university, I wasn't sure what I wanted to study. But the one thing that I knew that I wanted to do was to continue studying Japanese. And I got into that. I really liked learning the language. And I got to this kind of crossroads where I decided like, well, I put so much time into learning Japanese. Either I should give up because it's going to be a waste of time if I just keep going with this and I'm not serious about it or really get serious about it. And I decided to get serious about it. And that's when I really started to improve and became to actually able to speak the language.
- Speaker #1
And then you started to visit the country.
- Speaker #0
Well, the, the, the kind of trigger was my first visit to Japan in 2006. I went with a friend and I spent like four weeks there and I realized like, I've been studying like two and a half years, three years in university and I can't have a conversation. Like I can understand some things here and there. And that's when I had that kind of moment where I was like, well, either I need to get serious about this or like, it was fun and I should move on. Right. And, and then I decided like, okay, I'm going to get serious about this. And, and. that's when I started putting more time like outside of class and just like studying on my own time.
- Speaker #1
But then you start to visit to go and study but also work in Japan so how did you do that in terms of the visa situation and then how did you get keep going back to do that was on the tourist visa or was you getting like courses over there like or was it with in conjunction with your university how did that work?
- Speaker #0
Sure so the first time like I said was with the Fran just tourist visa then the second time was when I decided to do a study abroad and That was something that I had been wanting to do for years. And then, you know, when the eyesight thing happened, I thought like, well, that's probably not going to happen. But then I wanted to do it. I came back from that trip and I said like, no, like I want to keep studying Japanese. I want to be able to speak it. I should go. And then I started speaking to my Japanese teacher and this and that. We figured it out. And I said, okay, I think I can do this. And then I started studying, studying, studying every single day. And thankfully I was able, I was going to school with scholarships. So that. That paid for basically all of my study in Japan. Spent a year there in Osaka. Was a wonderful experience. Osaka is great because it's such a well-placed city. And it's right next to Kyoto. So I would go to Kyoto so many weekends. Of course, the cherry blossoms and the fall foliage and special events. And then going to Osaka and just traveling around that whole area. It was a year of just almost every weekend going somewhere. But then that made me realize like... I lived in a dorm and I was mostly living on my own, going to the supermarket on my own. And that really made me realize like, hey, I can live an independent life. I know enough Japanese to live comfortably in Japan. If I'm in trouble, I can explain my situation, my eyesight. I can understand what people tell me is like, hey, walk this way, walk this way if I'm asking for directions. That gave me the confidence to try to go back again. And then from there, like I went back to Florida, taught some Japanese. for a little like a year while I applied to the JET program basically to become a teacher in Japan, an English teacher. And I got accepted and I was able to go to teach English for three years in Kobe, which is right next to Osaka. So same area. And Kobe is a beautiful city too. So very happy that I was placed there. And three years teaching English elementary school, junior high, and the school for the blind. That was another wonderful experience. And I was teaching Spanish kind of. on the side secretly. I'm not supposed to, but I would think that's it. So I'm making a little extra money there. Why not? Yeah, yeah, yeah. And so like just, I loved learning the language and just Japan for me, like as a person with... that can't drive, for example, there's trains everywhere. It's so easy to get around, so easy to just live independently there. And again, because I can speak the language, I rarely have problems with that. Yeah. So it was just a wonderful experience. I love the history, the culture and all that. So, you know, getting to be there, of course, and experience like school life from the perspective of a teacher, but nevertheless, getting to see that side of Japanese society was also very interesting. And I enjoyed that as well.
- Speaker #1
And can you speak the language, would you say, fluently now?
- Speaker #0
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, I make mistakes here and there. Of course, I'm not a native speaker, but I do do translation. I've done interpretation as well. So yeah, I produce content in Japanese as well. So I'm confident in my Japanese. Yeah.
- Speaker #1
Yeah, that's pretty awesome. That's amazing. And before we get stuck into the Kyoto to Tokyo walk, I wanted to ask, so if you're listening right now, watching right now, and someone's not really lived there before maybe visited but lived i assume these different cities like osaka kyoto tokyo okabe or hiroshima or negasaki they all have their own little quirky niche about what that city's about right so what we're going with this question is where should someone put themselves first to maybe like settle into japan life if they're staying a bit longer than a tourist visa right so for me for example if i was to analyze my four weeks there tokyo would be an interesting place to start because it's crazy it's so big Osaka we found equally as quite intense and when we walk there like there's things above us leveled underneath us that is all going on Kyoto a bit more traditional and chilled out and down the south Nagasaki was like way like people a bit more different there like than traditional Japanese I think a bit more quirky a bit more of a laugh if you like in terms of the western culture and Hiroshima was just
- Speaker #0
quite an interesting place because of the history so yeah that's kind of where i'm going in your view where would you place someone first just to get used to the idea of the japanese culture i mean you you you i think you highlighted the fact that yeah each each region can have its own kind of personality quirks there there are certain stereotypes that some to some extent can be true and sometimes maybe not not always true but yeah like tokyo for example just such a dense city like i i you know, like I said, you know, I walked from Kyoto to Tokyo and I had to walk across Tokyo and that walk made me realize like Tokyo is not that big, but it's so dense. So many little side streets, so many, you know, up and down in the buildings, in the basements and just, yeah, yeah, yeah. So you can spend, you know, a week, two weeks, three weeks, just exploring just little towns and little areas of Tokyo, just outside of like the most famous places. You know, I think that's great, but. Tokyo is Tokyo, right? Like once you get out of Tokyo, like you start to see like just completely different areas. You know, like Kyoto, as you mentioned, like is great in terms of the history, the temples, the shrines and all that. Very touristy. You know, there's a lot of tourists over there. It can get crowded. So like it can get quite expensive, especially during like the cherry blossom season. I think Osaka is a great place to spend some time in because it's such a well-located city. There's some affordable places in Osaka as well. So you can spend time in Osaka. You can take the train over to Kyoto. You can take the train over to Kobe. You can go over to like Himeji Castle, which is further away from Kobe. But that's one of the most famous castles in Japan. And of course, the bullet train is there. So you can hop on over to Nagoya. You know, like Osaka, I think, is a great place if you want to just go around. You know, after you're done with Tokyo, maybe like Yokohama is a great place too. Because... then you can start to get into like the other areas of like, for example, the Hakone area, which is really well known for some hiking, but also like the what's it called the hot springs. And Yokohama itself also right on the ocean and just very historic as well with like international trade and all that Chinatown. So like I like Yokohama quite a bit. I like kind of like the cities that are right next to like the famous ones, because those tend to be like really good hubs to go around that area as well.
- Speaker #1
Because there's so many of them. like you can literally look at a map and go right i'm not going to go to tokyo koto nasaka and you look next door on the map it's like oh wow yeah there's all these other cities that are huge and you don't really know much about them because they don't get the light so they'll be pretty cool to go and check out i think
- Speaker #0
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And Yokohama also, like, I think consistently gets voted, like, one of the most, like, easy places to live. I think there was just a list that came out this year, a Japanese list, and Yokohama was right at the top. It's a very nice city. It's also, like, less, I don't know, maybe, like, 30-minute train ride to Tokyo. And, of course, there's the bullet train right there. So just really easy to get around. Like, the airport, which one was it? It's actually quite close. Like, the Haneda Airport, was it? I think. There's not even Haneda. I think it was Haneda, the one that was closer to Yokohama. A friend from Yokohama picked me up, drove me over there. It was very close. I didn't realize how close it was. So Yokohama is very nice. I do recommend it, especially if you're going to do a long stay. I think that's a good option. There you go.
- Speaker #1
Don't know much about it. We didn't go. Yeah. We went for four weeks, but didn't make it to Yokohama. Okay.
- Speaker #0
Yeah.
- Speaker #1
We're going to talk about your walk, which sounds incredible. The Kyoto to Chukuo walk. Can you tell the listeners and the watchers, what is that special name for that walk? And what does it encompass in terms of distance and time?
- Speaker #0
Sure. Sure. So There's multiple ways to travel from Kyoto to Tokyo in terms of the roads. But the specific one that I tried to stick to was the Tokaido, which literally means like the East Sea Road or route. Basically, it goes along the eastern coast. Right. And this is a very historically important road. Like even to this day, for example, the bullet train that travels in that area is called the Tokaido Shinkansen, the Tokaido bullet train. you know, the Tokaido people, that is still like a common name. But it was specifically important in the Edo period. So we're talking from like 1600 to 1868. And the reason for that is that at the time, the shogun, right? Like there's a, you know, there's a serious shogun, people have heard the word shogun, but the ruler said, okay, all the local lords have to travel back and forth from their local domain to Tokyo at the time called Edo periodically throughout the year. So that was to prevent rebellion. So it was a way to make the lords spend money on these caravans to go to the capital. And then they would sequester their families in the capital and then the lord would have to go back to his domain. So if they tried to rebel, then they had the wife or whatever in Edo. So it was this whole way to keep the economy going, but also control the local lords and keep them like, hey, don't act up because we got your family over here, right? It was a very, the system worked for like over 250 years. But so because of that, there were these roads that became very developed. They were already like these roads that were there, but they became even more developed because there were need for these travelers, right? And there were these post towns along the way, 53 post towns on this Tokaido Road. This was the most famous of these roads between the West Japan and East Japan. And on... Tokaido specifically, there were these 53 post towns. And basically what these were, were like kind of rest stops, almost like highway rest stops like nowadays where, you know, there would be a place to sleep and food and entertainment and the geisha and the pleasure quarters and this and that, right? Like, you know, people would walk who knows how many kilometers, 40 kilometers, 50 kilometers, maybe in a day, and then, you know, rest there and then walk, walk, walk. And the whole distance of this is roughly around 500 kilometers. There's different measurements, but generally people say 500 kilometers, roughly around 300 miles. So these 53 post towns are famous also because they got immortalized in these woodblock prints. There's these 53 woodblock prints. And, you know, if you look it up, it'll pop up right away on Wikipedia. The beginning is considered Tokyo Edo at the time. Nipponbashi, it's this bridge in Tokyo, right by Tokyo Station. And then you have... the 53 stations, the post towns. And then the last, the end point is this bridge in Kyoto called Sanjo Ohashi, the bridge on 3rd Avenue, I guess you could translate it as. So and that is the kind of the technical end of this Tokaido road. And so I walked, I did it backwards in that sense in that I started at the bridge in Kyoto and walked all the way to the bridge in Tokyo.
- Speaker #1
And is that a very popular route now for like hikers and walkers?
- Speaker #0
Um, there are portions of that that are, most people don't walk the whole thing because, um, a lot of it now is just, you know, modern, you know, concrete and asphalt and highways. It's not, there are portions that are, let's, I'll be blunt. Like it's boring. It's like, uh, my phone tells me like walk 10 kilometers straight line along this highway. Okay, like it's hot and I'm like almost like starting to like daydream here and like just like walking like a zombie. But there are there are some very nice areas. There are some hiking portions walking up the Hakone like this mountain ridge, which is like an hour train ride roughly from Tokyo, but probably like two days walk like walking up the Hakone area. That was just a really, really nice thing. And there's this reconstructed checkpoint. So here's another thing that I didn't mention. travel at the time was very restricted. So you had to have papers that, they call them passports in a way, but basically it was like your local village guy said like, yes, this guy has permission to walk to this area or travel to this area. And they had like the samurai at the checkpoints. And if you didn't have permission, I don't know, you could even get executed in some situations. But like, it was very, very controlled, like especially women and, you know, women leaving the city was very like, no, no, because like that could have been like one of those lords, like their wife trying to escape before a rebellion. So, or people trying to smuggling guns into the capital as well. Like that was another big concern. So anyway, one of these checkpoints was restored in the Hakone area. And it's beautiful. It's beautiful. Like, especially if you're into history, like it's a great place to go. It's right by Lake Ashi, which is a beautiful lake, almost at the top of this mountain ridge. If you walk up to the top, you can see Mount Fuji. It's just beautiful. The day was beautiful the day that I went there. Like, it was a wonderful, like, just picture of Mount Fuji right there from the top of the mountain. Like, I hiked up it. There's like a restored area with like kind of cobblestones and inclines and all that. That was just a great area. So there are some. Wonderful areas to walk along. And I can give more examples if you want. Quite a few of the areas are not that interesting. So some people walk, but like walking the whole thing is not that popular.
- Speaker #1
But Hakone, we went there. We went to an onsen.
- Speaker #0
Yeah, yeah,
- Speaker #1
yeah. It's very idyllic there, I thought, in Hakone. The train goes in. It's very nice. Almost like in the hills or the valley, I think, if I remember correctly. But it's known for some onsens there. So that's a... day I got rescued by a vending machine because I've got my towel and there's one in the changing room as I was kind of getting stripped to go in the pools because I divided out into female and male right so I couldn't yeah my partner to give me my towel because she was well gone so yeah that was um that was an interesting situation but her cranium looked it looked amazing yeah
- Speaker #0
I must admit yeah yeah yeah like you were probably in the Hakone Yumoto area which is like kind of the bottom area that's where you got like the hot springs and all that mainly um you And then if you go up a little bit, then that's where the Tokaido hiking trail starts.
- Speaker #1
I see. So if people want either a trail or some nice springs to go and chill out in, it's a good place to be. Definitely.
- Speaker #0
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- Speaker #1
I've got some questions about some challenges that you faced on your trail. Of course, it's a heck of a distance. That took you 29 days? If maths is doing me correctly, was that like 20, 18, 17, 18 Ks a day? Something like that?
- Speaker #0
Yeah, I guess it averages out to that. But like... most days I did around 20 kilometers and some days I did more, some days I did less. And there were like three, four days where I had to take the day off for various reasons. Like one day, like I got a blister, I had to go get shoes and this and that. So just, just stuff happens. Right. But here's the thing though, like the, as you were mentioning with challenges, like for me, like I can't see the street signs. Right. Like, so even if there's a sign that says like, you know, this is the right way, whatever, this is the Tokaido that you should be walking on. Like, I can't see it. I can't see, like, for example, that I'm this side of the road that the sidewalk is going to end. So I'm sure there were some times where like the sidewalk was on the other side, but I was literally walking on the side of a highway because I didn't know the sidewalk was on the other side. Getting lost was like pretty much a daily occurrence. I was just going on Google Maps. You know, like I'd put in sometimes like an intermediary goal for the day or like I'd break it down into two or three goals and just walk there. But along the way, like I would get lost. one time, basically like the middle of rice fields. And I had to like call out to a guy that was on some kind of farming equipment, like in the middle of a rice fields, like, Hey, I'm trying to get to this place. Like, it was like probably like 10 kilometers away. So he was probably like confused, like seeing this, like foreigner holding like a white cane. It's like, wait, like what you're walking there. Like that was, that was like so many times I would go like, I'm trying to get to this place. And the person said like, well, if you take the trains, like, no, no, I'm walking there. It's like, are you sure it's really far? Like, no, no, I'm trying to walk there. Actually it's on purpose. And they go like, really? Are you sure?
- Speaker #1
like yeah like i walked from kyoto so like five kilometers is not a big deal that must have been there must have been such a goad right you've been walking so so far and so long and he's like well you just get a train for two minutes and you're there like no i've got to walk another two or three hours and no that so many times and like i had people like are you okay i can give you a ride like no no i'm doing it on purpose you
- Speaker #0
But going back to what your question, like when you look up, like how long does it take to walk the Tokaido on Google or whatever? Usually you see like 20 days or 21 days. Okay. So it's totally possible. Like I see videos of like some Japanese people, like they'll walk like 30, 40 kilometers in a day. Like there's people that have done this and documented it. You know, like I'm fit. I run, I walk, I go to the gym. But the problem for me was I would get lost. Right. So like I would, I would go out in the morning and I would, I would, I would do 20 kilometers like. over seven eight hours and but i know physically i can do it faster it's just that so many times along the way like google maps might like here's the weirdest thing about google maps like it tries to get you the shortest way but sometimes the easiest way is not the shortest way like if i just walk along the highway i'd save myself an hour of getting lost Yeah. So that was like the daily battle that I was having. Like every single morning is like, oh my God, like, am I going to get like 40 minutes, an hour lost again? And a lot of days I did. So, but that was just part of the journey. Like I just had to keep on going and figure it out. And you know, I, I made it 29 days. I had to skip like a couple portions that were a little bit too dangerous for me to do by myself, you know, because they were like literally like hiking and, and, you know, stone areas and there was nobody there with me. So. I had to kind of like either walk around it or take like a six kilometer portion of the train, like just run past that part. You know, that didn't happen. But again, yeah, average around 20 kilometers, some days more, some days less. And then it ended up being I arrived in Tokyo on day 29.
- Speaker #1
Did you along the way just plan each day as it comes in terms of like accommodation and where to stay to see how you get on? Or did you always have a target in mind?
- Speaker #0
All right. So I the first let's say like five, six days, I planned that. pretty carefully. I booked the first few, the first two hotels or two, I think. Yeah. And then, um, the problem was like, I wasn't 100% sure how much I was going to be able to advance in a day. So then I, I, I started booking hotels as I went along, um, and, and planning like each part of the trip, like just a few days before, once I started realizing like, okay, 20 kilometers is a pretty, uh, safe distance that I can do without pushing myself too hard. Um, And, you know, making it by nightfall, like 5.30, because I was doing it in the fall. So 5.30, it was dark. So I had to get to the station. What I was doing, I was getting to train stations and then train back to my hotel. And then next morning, I would ride the train back to where I left off. Most of it. Okay.
- Speaker #1
Yeah.
- Speaker #0
Because a lot of these rural areas don't have like hotels in them, right? Like I was going through some very rural areas at the time. So I had to like kind of have a hub in like a more populated area. And then. go back and forth morning, night, morning, night. So yeah, by the time that I was a few days into this, I started realizing like, okay, about this is how much I can do. And then I started getting an idea, right? So if I can probably spend like four or five days in like, for example, Nagoya, which is a big city, and I can get to about this distance. And then if I have to extend, I'll extend. I did extend a couple times in some places. And then once it seemed like, okay, it seems closer to move to the next hotel, then I would move hotels. And then from there, I would start to kind of backtrack and walk, walk, walk, walk, walk, walk. So yeah, it was just like little by little moving hotels and moving back and forth on the train in the morning and night.
- Speaker #1
And did you meet anyone along the route or was it purely pretty much solo?
- Speaker #0
So I didn't meet like anybody like hiking or doing like the trail like me. But just along the way, I met so many people. Like, for example, like I have a pretty decent following in Japan of Japanese people. And so they were like, I actually live in this like little rural town that you would never go to. When you get to the train station, I'll be there. I'll meet you.
- Speaker #1
That's awesome.
- Speaker #0
Yeah. And so like I ended up like with this with this lady, like we went to like a little local supermarket and drank like some smoothies of like local vegetables, you know, like or like this person that lived in like a pretty rural areas. Like, I'll go pick you up at the end of the day. We'll go like to some random little like teshoku, like little like food place. And so a lot of places like I was actually able to. meet people that I had only interacted with online. And then just on the road, there were so many just really, really nice people that go like, they would stop and take, Hey, the sidewalk's about to end. Let me walk you over to this side or this and that. Or like at restaurants, this one lady, she started talking to me because she noticed I was looking for the chopsticks. Like I wasn't sure exactly where it was. And then she's an older lady. She started talking to me. turned out that she loved Hawaii. She told me like, I've been there 33 times and oh my God, I love it. I love it. I started talking, talking and she's like, I'm so sorry. I can't talk about Hawaii with my friends because they always think I'm bragging. It's like, no, no, no. I live there. I'm happy to hear about your Hawaii stories. And then I go like, okay, I got to go. Like I finished my meal. And then she's like, hang on, hang on, wait, wait, wait. And then she rushes over to the register and like, it's like, I'm going to pay. It's like, no, no, you don't have to pay. You don't have to pay. And then she's like, no, no, I paid, I paid. And she paid for me. And then she's like, where are you staying? Like, oh, she walked me over to the hotel where I was going to stay at. And. just incredibly nice. So like, I met a lot of people along the way and like restaurants, just random streets and all that. And it was just very, very nice people as well.
- Speaker #1
I would sort of expect that from Japanese people, because I think they're some of the nicest in the world, right?
- Speaker #0
Yeah, I mean,
- Speaker #1
I help you out somewhere along the line.
- Speaker #0
Absolutely. Yeah, like it was just what I've had plenty of nice experiences in Japan before this. But you know, when when you're in trouble, when you're like, Oh, crap, I have to like, cross here oh am i gonna have to like walk on a highway again like you know when you're in these situations then somebody just like shows up it's like hey hang on the sidewalk's ending there like let me walk you like i you're so grateful like i was just thank you so so much because like for me like i can't see like let's say you like a normally sighted person can look ahead and maybe see like a 15 minute walk ahead of them i'm just gonna walk there And then realize like, oh crap, this is a dead end. And then walk back. And that might be like 20, 30 minutes of wasted time. Right. And energy. And also like the psychological thing of like, oh my God. All right. Now where, where do I have to go now? Like, you know, so when people would show up like that little angels, they'd show up and they go like, oh, let me help you out. Like, thank you. Thank you so much.
- Speaker #1
I do know that feeling. Once last year, we were on a road trip across Canada and USA and we're in the West Coast. I think in Redwood National Park, somewhere near there. And we walked this trail. So we parked the car in the car parking lot, walked to the start of the trail, which is another five or six kilometers back. And the plan was to start the trail. And then at the end of this trail, it'll come back around to the car park because it sort of links over to the water and then into the car park, right? So it's like a loop. Sure. So we walked to the start point, got on the trail. Saw loads of people doing it. Thought, oh, great. Yeah, seems normal. Walked to probably a... about 500 meters we could see the car park we're level but there's a big gorge in the middle so you can't just go across right so we're like oh that's the car park we're nearly there and there's this huge felled redwood tree in the middle of the path i'm like what's that doing there like the ranger told us oh yeah the path is clear you can do this go around like oh that's a bit weird so we started to look around for another way around it no paths and this tree is huge i'm not talking like one you can climb just like step over it this is a huge tree like oh we're stuck here and then there's no one else around. So we walked all the way back and I was absolutely devastated because the energy and your mental capacity, like, oh, we're nearly there. We're literally minutes away from finishing. You now have to walk an extra, must be at least an hour, hour and a half maybe to get back to where you started and then back again from the road, right? So yeah, incredible mental strength to keep going every day for that. Yeah, I applaud you for that.
- Speaker #0
Well, thank you. Thank you. Yeah, let's just say like it took you an hour and it would have taken you an hour and a half to... walk the rest of the trail like it's it's not the same because you got that like mental things like yes oh my god i have to backtrack it's like oh like it feels like a waste of time in a sense like the way there it was fun you enjoyed it but then now you have to walk back like oh no one's speaking anything we're just like marching back and then marching back up again and we
- Speaker #1
got back to the start point we're like oh because we saw some people come back from the trail we're like we thought they must have seen the tree and no one said anything but we asked a few people like oh yeah we saw the tree That was it. We turned around, but no one said anything. If they were told us at the start, we obviously went and walked all the way down that trail to see that tree. Strange, strange, phenomenal. Yeah, there we go. Hey, just a quick one. I just want to say there are many ways to support this podcast. You can buy me a coffee and help support the podcast with $5. Or you can go to my merch store with the affiliate link with T public, where there's plenty of merch available to buy, such as t-shirts, jumpers, hoodies, and also some children's clothing. Thirdly, which is free you can also rate and review this podcast on apple podcasts spotify pod chaser or good pods also you can find me on social media on instagram twitter facebook and tiktok simply just search for winginit travel podcast and you'll find me displaying all my social media content for traveling podcast and other stuff thank you um my next question for you is what did you learn about yourself on this trail because obviously you know yourself pretty well at that point but I guess an intense trip like this where you've got to walk every day, those sort of challenges that you come up with, it's going to probably make you learn something about yourself that you probably didn't know before.
- Speaker #0
Yeah. Yeah. You know, like I think that it's, it comes down to with something like this, I think with travel in general, but especially with like this kind of like Shrek kind of thing, like you, you, you don't, you can't plan everything right. You, you like. rain, for example, like I was, I was hoping every single day it wouldn't rain. There were only like two days where it rained one day, it rained kind of bad. The other day, it wasn't that bad. Like it cleared up middle of the day. So it wasn't that bad, but I was very fortunate with, with the rain, but like, it's, it comes like what my, my point here is that like, you can't anticipate everything. And sometimes things don't go bad. Like you just have to accept it and just deal with it in the moment. Like, you know, that, that goes back to my eyesight. It's like, you know, I, There's things I can't do, but I have to find a way around it and deal with it in the moment. But that's more of a big picture thing. And when you're doing something like this, it's like every single day, right? Every morning you're praying, like, I hope it's not raining. I hope the weather's okay. And then I hope I don't get lost for like two hours. I hope, like, here's another thing, for example, like there were multiple tunnels throughout the way. The very first one, I actually walked through a tunnel that I wasn't supposed to walk through because Google Maps was telling me to walk through the tunnel. But. That wasn't for pedestrians. Oh. No. I was literally walking like on, on the road and cars were kind of going around me. Um, and, and then like two, three minutes after I got out of the tunnel, the police came and two police officers came to go, Hey, you walked through the tunnels. Like, and in Japanese we're talking, right? And they go like, yeah, I'm sorry. Was I not like that? That's not allowed. I'm sorry. I didn't know. They go, yeah, that's, that's not for pedestrians. I guess there was a camera there. Um, and, and, um, and so they're like, so where are you going? This and that passport. And they radioed in, I didn't get arrested. Thankfully they, I just explained like, you know, sorry, I didn't know, you know, and they saw my cane and then they asked like, where are you going? And I go, Tokyo. This is the very first day I was still in Kyoto. But from there on out, like I was always very paranoid about tunnels and there were multiple tunnels I had to go through. Like, I can't see the maps on Google Maps very well. Like, I can kind of see like some lines there and there, but like, I can't tell like the fine detail. So like, I was just going, understanding that. I may have to like walk through some highway areas. I may have to walk through some tunnels. I may have to do this and that. You know, like I walked through like one tunnel that was like 14 minutes long to walk through. It was huge. I didn't know it was there. Like that was just a total surprise to me. Thankfully, there was a little sidewalk area. But the thing is, like, I didn't know what to expect on a lot of days. Like I had a rough idea of where I was going to begin. And well, I knew where I was going to begin and I knew my goal. And I knew like sometimes a little bit along the way, like certain areas that I had to kind of pass through. But I didn't know where I was going to get lost. I didn't know where there was going to be a tunnel a lot of times. I didn't know, you know, a lot of aspects. I didn't, I didn't know if there was going to be a place to eat in some places. So I just had to like buy stuff at the convenience store in the morning and put it in my backpack. So like just accepting that there are things that are beyond my control. And when something doesn't work out, I just have to decide in the moment. Like if it's raining in the morning, I have to, I had to calculate, like, do I have enough days? to take it off or am I going to have to walk this in the rain? It ended up working out all okay because my return flight was on day 31. So I had 30 days to do this, but I didn't want to have to cancel, but I had a hard deadline, right? So all this stuff was always like every single day, next day, what am I going to do? What am I going to do? I had to plan it out, plan it out, figure it out, figure it out. Oh, no hotel here. Okay. So maybe there's a hotel here. Oh, just accepting there's challenges along the way and that you have to... You can't predict everything, right? But you have to deal with it when it happens and you deal with it in the best way you can in that moment.
- Speaker #1
And my next question, you did mention food. This is kind of two prongs, really, like some of your favorite Japanese food. But what was fueling the trip? Were you like a ramen person after a hike or were you a Japanese curry? What was your go-to meals, if you like?
- Speaker #0
I love, you know, food in Japan. Like it's generally very affordable and even the cheap stuff is quite good. But usually, so this was my... plan for most of the trip in the morning, I would go to the convenience store, buy like maybe two rice balls or a sandwich, maybe like a salad, basically stuff that I could easily carry in my backpack that wasn't going to like spill or get messy. And that was my lunch because, well, one, I was walking in a lot of rural areas where I couldn't count on there being like a convenience store exactly like, you know, five minutes away from me at every single turn. But also, you know, finding a convenience store would have been another, maybe like in some situations, 30, 40, 50 minutes.
- Speaker #1
Yeah. Yeah. Sure.
- Speaker #0
Because like the, how can I put it? Like traveling 10 kilometers for me is, is not such a big deal, but a lot of times the most annoying thing is finding that last little location because you have to like turn here, turn there, turn here, turn there. And then if I have to like stop and then input a convenience store and see where it is and try to find it, like that was just a waste of time. And I didn't have that much time. So. Most days I would go to the convenience store, pack my lunch, boom, put it there. And I'd literally sit on a sidewalk or stand on the side of a highway and eat or like sit, lean on a guide rail or something like that. Like on one of those guardrails. So many days. Yeah, I did that. Just like sitting literally on the sidewalk. And hey, convenience store, nothing wrong. Convenience store. Oh, yeah. It's actually quite good in Japan. Yeah, yeah. It's better than in the US. So, you know. No complaints in that regard. I mean, I did start to get a little tired of the rice balls by like day, I don't know, 15 or 20. But nevertheless, I went through like all the flavors, I think. But in the evenings, it was more fun because in the evenings, like I did have curry like one time because I was just like walking like I smell curry. Like, OK, I'm just going to pop in there. And I go like, hey, I didn't. I think it was a Coco Ichi, which is like one of the most famous chains in Japan. Right. Yeah. People love it. And it's good. It's good. But. i i can't see the sign so i just smelled curry like okay please walk in it's like hey what do you have what's your special like okay i'll go with that or like another place like i smelled like something like ramen and ended up being like this like nagoya style ramen with like entire heads of like garlic in it. It was called like stamina ramen. It was quite good, but you start to smell like garlic, right? Like another place in Hamamatsu in Shizuoka, like it was a kushikatsu place. So basically it's these deep fried skewers and right, it's on a counter. Well, I was sitting at the counter and then the chef is in front of you, deep frying these skewers and vegetables and seafood and meat and whatever. And it was like all you can eat in the sense of like, they'll give you it was omakase so they pick three at a time they'll give you three skewers at a time you eat the three skewers and then if you don't do anything they'll keep giving you the three skewers at a time um until you let them know it's like okay i'm done i i don't know i probably ate like 30 40 skewers and uh i think that day was like a particularly hard day i got really really lost i lost my like earbuds i barely made it to the station in time that day so i was like no i'm just gonna eat today and very affordable compared to especially hawaii so like Every evening, more or less, was like a lot of discovery. Sometimes I'd look on the phone. But the thing about the phone is like it'll tell you it's at the train station, but the train stations are like mazes. So once you're in the train station, you can't find the restaurant via the phone. So a lot of times I would just like, this is a restaurant. walk in excuse me what do you serve here because i couldn't see the menus right so many times i just did that and sometimes it was like oh i've already had that like yesterday so walk to the next one walk to the next one and and you know i had some nice surprises with like that the fried skewers and all that so the evenings i got to just have little food adventures i
- Speaker #1
guess you're knackered from the trail right so my last question is the day before you flew out i guess that was like one day you're not walking right so what did you do that day to reflect on your trip and you Or were you just completely tired and just chit-chatting on the hotel?
- Speaker #0
So the, let's see, the day before, I actually ended up seeing a friend that I hadn't seen in a long time. But that evening, I had a little bit of a party in Tokyo. A friend owns a bar there. And then, like I said, I have some, I have quite a few followers in Japan. So I just said like, hey, I'm going to be here on this evening in Tokyo. Whoever wants to come, come check it out. Maybe like 30 people ended up coming from Japan. originally from other people from other places too um and one of those like i have a friend that he he has a costume character he he does this that's his job like he created a one of these big japanese characters he's a rugby mascot ragamaru kun is the name but he came he lived right in that area he walked from his like a house i guess in the costume came out to the store and he's like my friends told me like hey there's somebody out there for you and i walked outside like oh my god it's the costume character so That was my last day. Like it was a really fun thing getting to see all these people that came out to see me. And we had a good time in this bar. And then the last day I, the last, last day was like in the afternoon, I had to get on the plane, but well evening, but in the morning I was free. So I did, I, I'm a content creator. I like to create videos about Japan and all that stuff. So I thought, what can I do with just a few hours? That's super interesting and funny and unique. Plus I'm tired. So I don't want to like walk a bunch. And the idea that I came up with was go get a massage. in akihabara which is like the nerd area of japan okay and it was like by a maid you know so there's this like maids they're dressed like french maids right and and they're like these maid cafes but there's also like a maid massage and and it's just like a normal totally normal massage nothing weird or whatever it's just they're dressed like men and so i did yeah yeah it really is it really is and they they call you like master and this and that but it's just like she's a trained masseuse Normal massage. And so I ended up doing a video about that, right? So I was able to turn that into content as well. And I got a nice massage after walking for like, you know, 500 kilometers. Needed. Nice. Two birds, one stone.
- Speaker #1
And you're planning to do another walk.
- Speaker #0
Is that Kyoto to Hiroshima or Hiroshima? How do you pronounce that place?
- Speaker #1
Hiroshima.
- Speaker #0
Hiroshima. So you plan to do a walk there. How long is that? And do you anticipate the same challenges maybe? So,
- Speaker #1
yes. So I'm planning to do this again in the fall. So it'll be like one year after the first trip, the Tokaido trip. This will be Kyoto to specifically it's Miyajima. So Miyajima is very, very famous. So it's you've probably seen pictures of it if you haven't been there yourself. But it's that Torii Gate, the red gate that's in the Oshima. yeah yeah yeah so the when the tide is up it's in the water when the tide is down you can walk out to it yeah and that's like on this island right off of the coast of hiroshima so my my final destination is there and um in in terms of distance it'll probably well just that stretch is a little over 400 400 kilometers i i think this time around what i want to do is um maybe like take a few detours like maybe like a little extra like hiking path through this like abandoned trail uh railroad that I really like in Osaka. And like, for example, just visiting some areas in Kyoto or like in Kobe, there's this life-size statue of one of these old giant robot like anime things. It's a really cool little area, park in Kobe. Like kind of trying, like instead of just making it all about walking, also take a little bit of extra time to show off some interesting areas. So I think between these detours, I may get close to the 500 kilometer mark again. I anticipate it'll probably take me pretty much like, I don't know, almost 30 days. Just to make the most of it, I want to shoot as many videos as possible and do it again. You know, I used to live in that area. So for me, I haven't been to Kobe in years. So it'll be wonderful to walk through that area again, see like some of the areas where I used to commute every single day and work. I think the Kansai area will be a fairly easy walk. But then once I start to get into the more rural areas, that'll be more like uncharted territory again. So I do anticipate getting lost a lot in those rural areas. But that's part of the journey, right? Like if it was easy, it wouldn't be as interesting. So I'm totally fine with that. And part of the point of what I do of these things is to show, you know, like how I deal with those problems as somebody with a visual impairment. To show the fact that I do use a white cane. To show the fact that, yeah, like it may not be as easy, but I still find a way to do it. But. to do it in an interesting way, to do it in an entertaining way, and hopefully in an educational way. Like if somebody's interested in visiting some specific area of Japan, maybe they come across one of my videos and it's helpful in some way. So, you know, I try to do it like, I don't know, multiple things through this. And I think through this video series and my posts on social media, a lot of people did get to kind of learn about the fact that I have visual impairment. I'm not constantly talking about it, but I showed it in an organic way and they saw some of the challenges and they were able to.
- Speaker #0
learn a little bit about you know what it's like for somebody in my situation in those kinds of um you know when i'm doing something like that and that's quite important because i think people who are in the same situation probably need that content right also even even people without that maybe give them a bit of a if they've got an excuse of not to go to japan or that seems a bit difficult or too hard you might just give them a bit of a kick up the ass say hey let's just get there and and go and check it out you know i think it works both ways i think japan is a very very easy
- Speaker #1
country to visit as somebody, like, even if you don't know the language. Of course, transportation is great. Also, like we were saying, people are generally quite nice. Over the past 20 years, there's more and more English all over the place, even on menus. There's a lot of funny English too, but usually you get the idea. But also like, for example, somebody with a visual impairment, like here's something that maybe not a lot of people mentioned, but, you know, those big train stations, especially in Tokyo and big cities are super confusing, even for somebody that is. totally excited. For somebody that can't see the signs, it's even worse. But here's a wonderful thing. For somebody with a disability, even if you're in a wheelchair, if you go up to the window or the little office that's by the entrance to the turnstiles to get into the actual station, you tell them like, hey, I'm trying to get to this place. Could I get some assistance? They'll walk you up to the train platform. And then if there's a transfer, you have to change trains. Somebody will meet you there. They'll walk you over to the next train. Make sure you're on safely. They radioed it in. Oh, the person got on the train. And then there's somebody that meets you there at your final destination, walks you out to the turnstile. So I did this so many times because like I couldn't spend, you know, 30 minutes trying to figure out like I can understand the train announcements in Japanese, but if there's 20 platforms, like I'm not going to spend 30 minutes trying to find the right platform or even then, like even like there's a local train, there's an express train. It gets confusing. Right. So like just going up. saying like, hey, excuse me, I'm trying to get to this place. So easy. Sometimes you do have to wait a little bit because they can be very crowded. But if you do feel unsafe, if you have a visual impairment, if you're in a wheelchair, if you have some kind of mobility issue, that is absolutely an option. A lot of the train station employees, they can speak some English, especially in the morning.
- Speaker #0
urban areas so it's definitely something to be aware of that's great to know yeah that people can help you out that way we got helped out because my partner left her purse on the ticket machine so you do your ticket machine which is in itself it's a bit overwhelming you must have placed it on top right and left it there so we went this is in tokyo any station from the airport into town to hostels you want to get a wallet out or a purse out no purse like oh my god and what they did is the person at the hostel rang the train station and they've already collected it and they've already taken an inventory of what was in there so they're asking emma on the phone you know in quite decent english like what was in there to make sure nothing's been stolen or taken out and they're like oh yeah we'll keep it here you can come back and pick up any time like nothing stolen and i think the joke we would have like in london for example that would have been snapped up and taken in an instant right yeah yeah that's good to know absolutely
- Speaker #1
like um you know japan is you It's extremely safe. Of course, you know, maybe sometimes, you know, you do lose a wallet, somebody will pick it up. It can happen. But for the most part, it's really, really safe. I dropped the wallet one time on the bus, had a couple hundred dollars probably in there in yen, went to the bus, like warehouse, whatever it was, the final destination, final stop. And it was there. Everything was there. You know, people, this is like to Americans and to people from a lot of other countries, this is always like baffling. But something that a lot of Japanese people do is when they go to like a cafe or something or yeah, they have to like reserve a table, they'll leave their purse, they'll leave their wallet, they'll leave their phone on the table as a way of saying like, hey, this table is taken, they go take their order. They go like, oh my god, this would be gone in like a second, like here in the US. But that's just how safe it generally is in Japan.
- Speaker #0
Okay. And my next question is about YouTube. So you mentioned before you got a YouTube channel. So obviously, you're talking about Japan on that channel. What else do you talk about on there alongside Japan?
- Speaker #1
Yeah. So, you know, for me, like I started doing JapanKyo.com, like a news blog in 2016 that evolved into my podcast, Japan Station, where I interview people about Japan stuff. And then I started uploading that stuff to YouTube just as audio. But that doesn't do very well on YouTube if it's just the audio. Right. So in recent months, I've started to experiment with the YouTube side of things. And it's tricky. Right. Because like. What works for a podcast may not work on the YouTube side. So I'm currently in the kind of like trial and error process of finding what's going to work better on YouTube. But I do a lot of interviews with some travel stuff, you know, some language stuff, some wacky like Japan stuff as well. Yeah, that's always going to be there. But I'm trying to find like the kind of YouTube kind of series, a more specific thing that's going to work better on YouTube. I've been doing a lot of YouTube shorts as well, and that has been going quite well. Yeah, I think YouTube is really pushing that at the moment because they're trying to compete with like TikTok and everybody's trying to do the short format thing at the moment. So I found that my YouTube shorts tend to get significant amounts of views. So sometimes I'll do a little bit of news, Japanese, like funny news or Japanese, like language stuff. So, yeah, like Japan Kyo, if you look up Japan Kyo on YouTube, it'll pop up right away. If you go to Japan Kyo dot com, that's where all my Japan content is. It really is like anything and everything Japan from food to. travel to language stuff, to just interesting people doing interesting things in Japan.
- Speaker #0
Are you going to branch out to maybe like Hawaiian life and stuff like that?
- Speaker #1
That's, yes, yes. So I'm currently shooting videos in Hawaii and that may start as like a Hawaii only kind of thing. But long term, I would love to do more just general travel stuff, you know, as somebody with a visual impairment that It has a curiosity for going to other countries and wants to do more stuff like that beyond Japan. I love Japan and I'll always be doing that. But I want to keep kind of pushing myself and trying new things. Like long term, I would love to expand that new channel that I'm working on. So currently it's going to be just Hawaii stuff. I'm kind of starting small with that. But, you know, we'll see maybe maybe longer term. I may start to do like other stuff beyond that as well.
- Speaker #0
OK, and I got a bit of a nerd geeky question for you. What is your technology of choice? So when you're when you're out filming your content, what camera have you got?
- Speaker #1
or two cameras you might have two what microphone do you use and super geeky question what do you use to edit your videos in sure video editing is something that i only got into within the past i don't know eight months nine months or so so i'm not good at it i keep things as simple as possible because my my philosophy is if like if i get too carried away with like obsessing over the little details i'm just not gonna get things out in a timely fashion And I have the extra kind of barrier of my eyesight. So it's like, no, I've just accepted that. Like, it's better for me in this situation to just try to get it out as simply as possible and improve. As I keep doing it for me, like, for example, with the Tokaido thing, like what I did was I just used my phone. Like I just used my phone and I was holding it like as I was walking and I would talk into it. And because the phone was so close, like the sound quality actually ended up being quite good for most of it. I do have a lapel mic that I used a couple of times. And so, you know, that is something that I'm working with at home. I have a more involved setup. So I have a GoXLR. which is like a USB to XLR thing. It has like a soundboard, different, you know, the, the, the, what do you call them? Like the little switches for all the different, you know, equalizer and all that stuff. So that, that is a, I've been doing this since like 2017. So I decided like, I'm going to get that help save some time. And then yeah, long-term I would, I would love to, you know, expand more of the camera side, but right now it's more just like, I'm, I need to get used to working with, you know, just filming stuff. And then I can maybe. improve from there. In terms of like editing, I used to just use like Audacity completely for the audio. I still stick to that. Just keep it simple for the video. Honestly, like I'm just working with like free video editing software because I'm not doing anything like complicated. I'm just chopping things up, keeping it really simple. I try to, my video, when I'm outside filming stuff, I try to do it in a way that like it's minimal editing is involved. So I'm narrating as I'm doing it. Whether I switch that style up or not in the future, I don't know. I'll see. But for now, it's like... The priority is just get it out and then see what works. And then if I start to get traction with that style, I can keep doing it. If it doesn't, then I start to experiment maybe with some voiceover, trying different things.
- Speaker #0
Okay. And finally, how's it going as a full-time content creator? Are you enjoying it? Is it stressful? Is it promising? How do you view it so far?
- Speaker #1
So it is stressful in that I'm trying to grow this and turn it into something sustainable. I'm not there yet. Like I'm... I'm okay in terms of money. I like, I have enough income to survive, but like it's the, the content creation side is not at that point where I like, I could live off of that completely by, by any means. Same. But you know, like I'm, I'm fine with, I've seen growth over the years. Um, my, my Japanese language stuff has really taken off well, um, on, on X on my social media. So I do Japanese language content over there. And that's also part of the reason why I've decided. expanding into the hawaii side it may be a good idea because japan loves hawaii so that would be a good kind of starting point to grow that side um and then if i can keep growing that then i can kind of expand and then you know ultimately like the japan like the tokido thing the walk and the upcoming walk that is also something that that appeals to both sides like the english speaking side and the japanese language side so i'm trying to find a way to kind of attract both sides and just monetize little by little. For example, like the Tokaido challenge thing, like I was able to fund that because I was able to raise money like through sponsorships. So that was completely funded. So yeah, I mean, it ended up costing like over $5,000 and I was able to get donations for that. So that worked out very nicely. I was really, really grateful for that. And, and I I'm planning to, you know, try to raise funds for the next walk. And, you know, long-term, maybe I can, you know, write, write some stuff. I'm planning to maybe write some stuff in Japanese about my experiences and all that. It, it, content creation, it's, it's, it can be quite stressful monetizing all that, but I enjoy it. I enjoy it a lot. And, and it's given me these opportunities that I, I would never have done this walk if it wasn't that I could do this as, as basically a job. Right. And it's been a wonderful experience and I want to keep growing that. I think I was able to do something pretty unique and I have you. perhaps say somewhat of a unique perspective on what I do because of my visual impairment, but just my life experiences as well. You know, it's not easy, but I plan to keep trying and to keep expanding.
- Speaker #0
Okay. And where can the people find you in terms of the handles for all your content?
- Speaker #1
Yeah. So if you're interested in Japan, you want like just Japan content, the easiest thing to do is just go to JapanKyo.com. So J Japan, just normal spelling K-Y-O.com. That's where I post all my. podcast stuff, my interviews, the Tokaido challenge videos are there. Like every, everything is there. But if you look on YouTube, Japan, you know, you can find the Tokaido challenge playlist there as well. And then if, if you're interested in just my general stuff, maybe some of the more Hawaii stuff, you can find me Tony D O T Vega on Instagram. I'm going to be posting more stuff there moving forward. And yeah, X Tony dot Vega as well. You can find me there, but the Hawaii stuff is mainly going to be, I think on Instagram and then in the upcoming YouTube channel. So you can just on Google Tony dot Vega. Tony, just T-O-N-Y dot D-O-T Vega.
- Speaker #0
Okay, I'll put that in the show notes so people can click instantly. And I normally finish my episode with some quickfire travel questions. It's travel question time. I sort of make them up on the spot and they're kind of your favorite things that you've seen worldwide. So I'm going to kick off with three countries that you've traveled to that are your favorites.
- Speaker #1
Sure, sure. I mean, Japan, yeah, okay, but I talked about that already. So I'll put that aside. Taiwan, when I was living in Japan, I had the chance to take, well, it was like one of those low-cost carriers. So it's super cheap, get over to Taiwan. I spent like maybe like four days, five days, I don't know, over there. Just the food was amazing. The night markets. I went to so many night works, ate so much food. It was all really good. Very cheap. Yeah. And of course the sites and all that, you know, like the, the, the, the, the temples and just, I went a bunch of places, but yeah, the food, like I would, I would go back to Taiwan just for the food.
- Speaker #0
Same.
- Speaker #1
Yeah. So Taiwan was wonderful. What else? Actually, I have unfortunately not had the chance to go to Europe aside from once I was in Finland, like just a couple of years ago and I loved it. I loved it. I absolutely loved it. It was just so refreshing for me to get out of Asia, you know, just experience something different. I had a one of my Patreon supporters actually lives in Finland. Super nice guy. He drove us around a bit. We went out to eat some like traditional Finnish food and reindeer and just the food was great. Got to see like this old castle. There was also like the Moomin Museum. Moomin is this you know, character I don't know if in Japan he's very popular, but It's like fairy tale character, like children's book character. And there's a museum there. It was very, very nice. I'm not like a Moomin fan or anything, but it was very well done. Pretty new, actually. So Finland was a wonderful experience. I want to travel more in Europe. So that was a great first start in Europe.
- Speaker #0
Okay. And what about three countries tomorrow that you can travel to that are new ones that would be like in your top three list?
- Speaker #1
Sure. Let's see. So I love Asia. I want to see more of Asia. Hong Kong. I'd love to go check out Hong Kong. Outside of Asia, I have a lot of friends in Australia, actually. Sydney area, like I have places to stay there. And that's been like, I have to go, I have to go. And I just haven't had the chance to yet. But that's an absolutely, I will be going to Australia, hopefully in the near future. And then Greece, Greece. I really, really want to go to Greece. I love Greek food. The history, of course, is incredible there. I'm sure it's quite beautiful as well. So that's another one of those places that is just that I got to go. And I haven't had the chance to yet.
- Speaker #0
Okay. And tell me your favorite landmark in Japan.
- Speaker #1
Man, that's okay. Favorite landmark. Oh, that is really difficult. Let's see. Let's see. Let's see. Let's see. Let's see. Jeez. Oh, there's so many places that I'd love to. Okay, Kyoto. Kyoto. Let's talk about Kyoto. So this is such a, this is such a, I mean, most people that have been to Kyoto have probably been here. But for me personally, it's just such a fun place. Fushimi Inari. So it's that shrine with all the torii gates. Why does it stand out to me so much? It's because, well, it's a pretty unique location. You know, you just don't see something like that. There's maybe a couple other shrines that kind of do it similar, but not to that scale. Yeah. And it's just like these tunnels of these, you know, traditional torii gates, like the red gates. But also like for me as a person with the visual impairment, it's like, okay, I go to a shrine and I see the gate. I see the shrine. Okay, that's cool. It's interesting. I like the history, so I learned a little bit about that as well. I try to read up beforehand, but usually it's a short visit. But with Fushimi Nari, you've got basically a hike as part of this, right? If you want to go the whole route. For me, I've been there so many times and I still enjoy it and I'm sure I'll go back in the future because you get to go through this whole thing and sometimes there'll be a fox or something that like, like scurries across because it's basically in the mountains in the middle of like a... So there's a long way to walk around. It's really nice and... pretty unique and you get a nice view at the top as well. And then there's like an ice cream place at the top too. So yeah, Fushimi Nari, like I love that place. I often go back.
- Speaker #0
And is there somewhere in Japan that you've not been to that you'd love to go to next?
- Speaker #1
Yes, I have basically no experience in like the northern northeast Honshu area. So this is like north past Tokyo. It's most well known, unfortunately, for the 2011, you know, earthquake like that was one of the most. That was the area where that happened and the tsunami and all that. There's a lot of beautiful areas. Of course, in the winter, it gets super cold. If I continue doing these walks, I may do a Tokyo to up to that area walk. I would love to be able to say I've walked the whole length of Japan. But one step at a time. That costs a lot of money and one step at a time. But that is one area that I haven't been to yet. I've been to most of Japan. I've been to Hokkaido. I've been to basically most of Honshu and Kyushu and Okinawa and Shikoku. have not been to the area, I do want to explore that area.
- Speaker #0
Okay. And lastly, because you mentioned food a lot, I'm going to ask you your top three favorite Japanese dishes.
- Speaker #1
Okay. Top three Japanese dishes. Oh, let's see. Let's see. So, I mean, it's such a boring answer, but sushi, I love sushi. Oh my God. And so, so affordable, like the, the conveyor belt stuff is great, but also like, uh, you know, going to a proper place, sit down place where you, you, you get served and all that from the, the, the sushi chef, you know, this, just this past trip that I was there for walking the Tokaido, I went to a place near Yokohama known for seafood. So good. Um, it was just this little place basement. And we started talking to the chef, a friend was there. He's, he's from originally from Canada. We were talking and he's like, uh, my friend says, Oh, he's walking the Tokaido. I was like, Oh really? And then he gave us this like really like opulent, really expensive, like roll. And he's like, no, just it's for your stamina so that you can keep walking. It's like, oh, wow. You don't have to pay for it. It's like, oh my God. Like, wow. So super nice guy. But that was a great meal. So, you know, of course the conveyor belt stuff is great, really affordable. But if you can find like one of these little places, you know, where it's just like one guy behind the counter, nine seats, totally recommend it, you know, like tiny place. Aside from that. Let's see. There's the ramen. Every area has its own like unique spin on ramen. I spend a lot of time in Fukuoka. So Hakata ramen is something that I enjoy. I eat that a lot, but yeah, explore, look into, if you're in a new area, check because it might have its own unique spin on, on ramen. Okay. And then one, here's a little, it's not a full meal thing, but it's a korokke. So these are, they're, they're, it's, it's derived from like croquettes, like I guess the French croquettes, but They're like these potato, deep fried potato things. Usually they have something in the middle, like meat is the most common one, like ground meat. And my recommendation for that is look for either butcher shops that they, they, they may not be open all day. They just open kind of, and they close it. Like they go, they open early, they close maybe 5 PM or something. And usually in these butcher shops, they have like deep fried foods that you can just pick up a few, the croque there, the, the potato, like deep fried potato things are very good usually there. Or in popular areas. they may have like the little windows that are just like a little kiosk almost. And they're deep frying them right there on the spot. I love those. Whenever I end up, you know, seeing one, I usually end up having one and burning my mouth, but they're always good.
- Speaker #0
That's amazing. Okay. Tony, thanks for coming on to the podcast and sharing your story. Another great podcast about Japan. You've got a unique story for sure. And I'll be tuning in to your YouTube and your podcast to keep knowing what you're up to. And hopefully, or maybe, who knows? I'll see you one day for a podcast and a YouTube combined bit of content for our respective channels. And finally, I'm actually in Japan next year. So hopefully I might see you then.
- Speaker #1
Oh, maybe it overlaps. We'll see. We'll see. Let me know. But yeah, no, thank you for having me on the show. It was a pleasure. And yeah, man, just keep going. You've got so much, so much content. It's amazing. It's so hard to keep up with it, right? But you're doing it and you're expanding to YouTube. Like, it's wonderful to see as a fellow content creator. Like, I really admire that. Keep with it. Hopefully we can either maybe Hawaii or Japan. We'll meet up.
- Speaker #0
I'll open the list and I really appreciate your words. Yeah. Thanks so much. Yep. Thank you. Thanks for tuning in to the podcast episode today. If you've been inspired by today's chat and want to book some travel, if you head to the show notes, you'll see some affiliate links below, which helps support this podcast. You'll find Skyscanner to book your flight. You'll find Booking.com to book that accommodation. Want to stay in a super cool hostel? You'll see Hostelworld down there too. You'll find Revolut to get your travel card sorted. Click the GigSky link to get your eSIM ready for your trip. And more importantly, you'll find safety wing insurance to get that travel insurance for your trip. There are many more to check out. So when you click that link and book your product, a small commission goes towards me and the Wiganet Travel Podcast. Thank you in advance and enjoy your travels.
