Posts by Masterpo

nos Revolut

To pay in ¥, it's best to open an account... in ¥. That way, you can keep better track of your spending and, most importantly, avoid the currency exchange fees Revolut adds on weekends.

So, if I understand correctly, once the card is on the iPhone, you can't use the physical one anymore. Is that right?

Yes. Actually, if you have both—a physical and a virtual one—it’s better to finish using the physical one and then switch to the virtual, because 1) the physical becomes unusable after the transfer, and 2) the balances don’t combine.

I didn’t get the phrase "exit l’ornithorynque..." Sorry!

An IC card looks like this:

So, does that mean (and that would answer my question) that you can add the card to your iPhone, top it up with a Visa linked to your iPhone (like Revolut, for example) and still keep using the ICOCA as a physical card?

To finally try to answer your question, yes, you can actually have virtual IC Cards on your iPhone. They top up via Apple Pay, down to the exact yen, which is a huge advantage over the physical card.

There’s no interaction possible between the physical card and the iPhone, except in two cases.

You can transfer a physical card to your iPhone, keeping the balance, but the physical card becomes unusable. I learned this the hard way—I tried it with my ICOCA, and it worked, but then no more ICOCA: goodbye, platypus…

You can track the spending on your physical card via dedicated apps on your smartphone using NFC.

Note that the iPhone also supports, in addition to Japanese IC Cards, T-Money for Korea, Octopus for Hong Kong, and a bunch of Chinese transit cards…

Is it as widely accepted as a physical card?

Since an IC card only works contactless, yes, it’s exactly the same.

And how do you recharge it?

With Apple Pay, anytime, anywhere. Though, if you don’t have any credit card in Apple Pay, I don’t know.

The iPhone lets you have virtual IC cards (Suica, Pasmo, and ICOCA), which you can top up via Apple Pay, down to the yen. Absolute bliss.

For the budget, it obviously depends on everyone, but food really isn’t expensive. At a supermarket, you can feast on sashimi for around ten euros, and for the same amount, you can eat at an izakaya. Over 8 months of travel (cumulative), I only exceeded 5,000 ¥ (for 2) less than ten times—last time, in May, it was nearly 12,000 ¥ (still for 2), but that was for fugu… We’re nowhere near Parisian prices.

Did you notice that for its first anniversary, the new VF got dressed in baby blue-green?

The hex code is #32bcc5. If we ask AIs to define the color, here’s what we get:

Copilot Light blue-green (medium turquoise, light teal, soft cyan)

Perplixity Bright blue-green (between cyan and turquoise, lagoon blue)

Grok Bright blue-green (light cyan, aquamarine)

ChatGPT Soft cyan (between turquoise blue and light teal)

Claude Turquoise or turquoise cyan (between blue and green, with a cyan dominance, lagoon blue)

Gemini Shade of cyan and turquoise (aquamarine)

Deepseek Light cyan or turquoise (lagoon blue)

So basically, we can say it’s a blue-green.

What day is it?

I don’t have access to my photos, so I don’t have the dates, but from memory, it was two days before—like the 14th and 16th.

Any info on Gujo Hachiman?

No, I’ve never been there.

Between August + Obon and July + the rainy season, for me, the choice is easy. I went for 7 years in a row in August—absolute bliss. Just a few nights in Kyoto weren’t the easiest (30°C!)

Gozan no Okuribi—that’s what I call Daimonji. It’s packed, but since it’s in the distance, you can still see it well, and it’s pretty cool. A few days earlier, there’s the lantern festival in Nara, where the roof of the Daibutsu-den opens to reveal the Buddha’s head. Breathtaking!

Have you ever experienced this?

Nope!

Is it possible to get the name of the ryokan and the date in a PM, so I can check it out?

For luggage, it depends... If the suitcase exceeds 160 cm (L+H+W), it's better (or even necessary) to book the last seats in each carriage, so plan ahead.



Though it’s been possible recently to reserve a locked storage space, but I’ve never tried it.

Otherwise, for a carry-on or medium-sized suitcase, no problem.

About the price of Toyoko Inn, that’s odd—they’re business hotels and usually very affordable, with breakfast included. But I noticed the same thing this year. I paid less than 10 k¥ at the Toyoko in Izumo and 22 k¥ in Osaka for an identical room! I thought it was because of the World Expo, but it ends on 10/13...

Today’s tip: the Ferris wheel at Don Quijote in Dotonburi is a must-do...

For onsens, I don’t really get it. Kids can go in the baths. For a baby, it might be trickier, but at 10 years old, I don’t see an issue.

It can get complicated in the case of two dads with a daughter—it means leaving her alone to go bathe on the women’s side since at 10 years old, she can’t come to the men’s side anymore.

Of course, but that’s (presumably) not the case here.

Renting a car in Japan is nothing like in Mediterranean countries—it’s a real pleasure! I rented 4 (!) this year. No issues with returns, it’s quick. Though, there can be two cars arriving just before you…

No problem buying a Shinagawa-Osaka train ticket the same day either. You can always take unreserved seats, and at worst (which is very rare), you’ll travel standing up.

A day and a half in Osaka… it *is* Japan’s second-largest city, after all! But hey, it’s not my trip. Ending the arrival day in Shinsekai is nice. Going up to the top of Tsutenkaku is fun. I’ve been to Osaka 4 times, each time in a different hotel, including 3 Toyoko Inns, which I’d recommend—but they apparently don’t have triple rooms. For location, I think Namba is an excellent choice (ideally near Takashimaya).

As for onsens, I’m not entirely sure. Kids can go in the baths. For a baby, it might be trickier, but at 10 years old, I don’t see an issue.

If you find a ryokan with private baths for 300 € including three half-board meals, grab it! !

All Japanese rental companies are reliable: Nippon, Times, Toyota, Nissan. I’ve been using the Tocoo comparator for years.

you’ll need to have bought your flight ticket either partially or in full to be insured.

No, that’s a common mistake. The mandatory requirement is for insurance—like delayed or canceled flights, or unfulfilled reservations, etc. Medical care or repatriation falls under assistance, which is covered even if you don’t use the card. That said, the level of assistance does depend on the type of card, and it’s still highly recommended to have a premium card, even if it’s free.

Maybe Muriel18 and Masterpo have given it a try since then?

Nope… pfft… Still not. But I haven’t given up hope…

I won’t like it at all, but I think my daughter will

Yeah, you’ve gotta go at least once. And on Sundays, it’ll be packed—it’s an experience you’ve gotta have!

It was on an open discussion page that you might have forgotten to check, it's possible, I can understand that.

I know you're referring to that... mess that has nothing to do with me except for borrowing the name, but you'd have to be pretty... let's say... naive and unfamiliar with the internet to think that a site named masterpo, tatra, or any random username could only be opened by the person in question...

By the end, VF had become a cesspool thanks to (or because of) poor moderation. After it shut down, the cesspool first moved to another blog (whose name I won’t mention), before creating and infecting that said... mess, but with no moderation at all! It took months before it disappeared. For the record, I only posted two messages there, on the same day, under my username, long after it opened and long before it closed.

The question of whether it was your blog has already been asked elsewhere—you never answered. So put our minds at ease!

Those who think messages full of insults and spelling mistakes could have been written by me don’t need reassurance—just therapy...

It’s not luck you lack, it’s experience.

Probably. Since COVID, I’ve only flown to Portugal, Italy, and Japan, multiple times each, and every time, I’ve been asked for ID. (<- This is a point, period)

I could go on about the slander against VF and its founder that you hosted for years on a personal blog

To this day, I’ve only ever had one blog, which I stopped updating in 2012. And I never mentioned VF or its creator on it—you’re imagining things.

My knowledge of air travel (I assume that’s what you meant by "aérien," rather than your *style*) is admittedly limited—I only fly once or twice every three months—but I can confirm that I’ve always been asked for ID, whether in Europe or elsewhere. That’s just my experience, but it’s factual. Maybe it’s just bad luck, who knows…

Masterpo is the guy who was recently claiming that nowhere in Europe do you have to show ID to board a plane?

Uh, no, not at all. First off, while I might declaim sometimes, I never *clamor*. And yes, I’ve always said that in France, you need to show an ID to take a flight.

On the other hand, there’s this one guy who kept insisting you could fly anywhere in Europe without ID—until he got banned from another forum and, to everyone’s satisfaction, had all his posts deleted.

But anyway, the connection to currency exchange while traveling is pretty thin…

Indeed, I remember back in 1979 in the USSR, street exchange rates were more than twice as good!!

Yes, exactly. Twice was the initial rate you could get—30 rubles for 100 FF instead of 15. But quickly, after some haggling, it went up to 50, then 60, and even a bit more toward the end.

And afterward, you could only buy ice cream on the street, metro tickets, and a few rare items at the "GUM" on Red Square with rubles. Otherwise, you had to pay in foreign currency everywhere... and it was impossible to exchange them back before going home.

We’d have caviar & vodka evenings!