Destinations

Kansai-sake
Destinations, Kobe, Kyoto, Osaka

Kansai Sake Trail: Where to Taste, Buy, and Stay in Nada and Fushimi

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Two of Japan’s three great sake regions, an hour apart by train — and different enough to taste the gap between them in one day. By Biteway Japan · 7 min read Biteway Japan is reader-supported. Some of our guides contain affiliate links — if you book through one, we may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. Nothing here is paid placement. Nada and Fushimi brew sake from completely different water, and it shows. Nada, tucked between Kobe and Osaka, draws from a hard mineral spring called Miyamizu that pushes toward drier, more assertive sake. Fushimi, on Kyoto’s southern edge, uses soft water that comes out […]

Japanese grandmother about sweet potatoes
Destinations, ibaraki

Japan’s Sweet Potato Trail: Where to Eat the Best Yaki-Imo, Region by Region

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Ask a Japanese grandmother about sweet potatoes and she won’t shrug. She’ll have an opinion. Japan grows dozens of named satsumaimo varieties, each with its own texture, sweetness level, and hometown pride — and the country has turned roasting them into something close to an art form. Street vendors still push carts through winter neighborhoods calling out “yaki-imoooo,” and specialty shops sell a single sweet potato the way a bakery sells a croissant: individually, warm, and worth the wait. We built this guide around four regions where the sweet potato isn’t a side dish — it’s the whole point of the trip — plus a Tokyo-only section for anyone who

Japan's Best Mid-Autumn Moon Festivals
Destinations

Japan’s Best Mid-Autumn Moon Festivals: 5 Tsukimi Events Worth Traveling For in 2026

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There’s a specific kind of magic that happens in Japan every September. The moon gets its own festival. Not a fireworks show, not a parade with floats — just people gathering at temples, castles, and gardens to look up (and sometimes down, at a reflection) at the same moon their ancestors watched a thousand years ago. It’s called Tsukimi, and if you happen to be in Japan in late September 2026, you’re in luck. In 2026, the “Harvest Moon” — Chushu no Meigetsu, or the night of the year’s most celebrated moon — falls on Friday, September 25th. And because the date shifts every year based on the old lunar

Yanaka_Yanesen_Nezu
Destinations, Tokyo

Yanesen Guide: Yanaka & Nezu’s Old Tokyo Charm, Food & Where to Stay

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Most first-time Tokyo visitors see two versions of the city: the neon-and-skyscraper version (Shibuya, Shinjuku, Akihabara) and the temple-and-tradition version (Asakusa). Yanaka shows you a third one, a version of Tokyo that quietly survived both the 1923 earthquake and the WWII firebombing that leveled most of the surrounding city, leaving behind narrow lanes, wooden houses, and a genuinely unhurried pace that’s hard to find anywhere else this close to central Tokyo. It’s become a real favorite with international visitors in recent years, and once you understand what makes this pocket of the city different, it’s easy to see why. 🏘️ What Is Yanesen? Tokyo’s Old Shitamachi Neighborhood “Yanesen” (谷根千) is

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