So we decided that there was a 2-week window to grab a quick break. But that’s like one-week away. Is it possible to plan the usual DIY self-drive holiday at such short notice?
Aerial view of Fukuoka, our gateway to Kyushu.
The answer is yes, with the advent of the Internet. Here’s a recap of what I did for my own holiday.
Cutting it close
I booked the air tickets the day we decided to go for the break, the car rental the next day, 3 hotels on the third day, and the remaining 3 on the fourth day.
The remaining days were spent planning the itinerary for each stop.
It’s as close to the date of departure as I’ve ever tried going on a self-planned, self-drive vacation.
First the obvious, decide how long you’ve got and where you want to go. In my case, we’ve long wanted to visit Kyushu in Japan, and the window of opportunity available was roughly two weeks.
If you’re thinking of visiting Japan, I recommend this site called japan-guide.com. It has comprehensive descriptions of popular tourist spots all over Japan, as well as travel tips for Japan.
Even more useful is its forum where vacation planners get their queries answered in detail with advice from a community of fellow travelers, as well as useful links to resources – such as timetables, rates etc – outside of the website.
Next book the air tickets. The availability and price of last-minute tickets usually determine whether your vacation destination will become a reality.
Cameras of choice
For this vacation, I’m entrusting our memories to the Nikon D800, with the AF-S NIKKOR 24-70mm f/2.8G ED and the AF-S NIKKOR 70-200mm f/2.8G ED VR II lenses.
That’s almost 4 kg of camera gear but for the sake of image quality, I believe the 36.3-megapixel full-frame camera and two FX lenses from Nikon are worth every ounce of their weight.
Besides, we have the rental car to carry the gear between sights.
For a second camera, my wife will be carrying our trusty Olympus E450 with the ZUIKO DIGITAL ED 14-42mm F3.5-5.6 kit lens.
I use Zuji.com to get a feel of the airlines plying Singapore and the possible stops and the price range, then if there’s time, check competing sites or the airline’s website for better rates.
For Kyushu, it was pretty straightforward, only Singapore Airlines fly directly there from Singapore – to Fukuoka. It’s straightforward until you hit the SIA website. For a premier airline, it sure has a terrible website for bookings and reservations – plenty of long waits.
Next is the car rental. I use ToCoo car rental. It helps you check the rates for multiple car rental companies with cars available in the cities where you intend to pick up and drop off the car. But you’ve got to compare rates manually yourself.
Computing on the go
For computing, I’m bringing along the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon Ultrabook, a BlackBerry PlayBook, and the Seagate 1TB Backup Plus.
The X1 Carbon is sleek in design, wonderfully thin and light, yet powerful enough for surfing Web and running Photoshop and Dreamweaver CS6 for photo-editing and blogging back in the hotel room.
The 7-inch PlayBook keeps the children entertained with game apps, and serves as an e-book reader. Its biggest bugbear is that it’s the Wi-Fi version and does not have 3G, but I don’t use 3G data in Japan anyway.
To store and back up the 40MB RAW photo files generated by the D800, I brought along the 1TB Seagate Backup Plus Portable Drive. The 2.5-inch plug-and-play drive constantly backs up the hard disk and makes posting photos online a breeze.
Usually, I pick up the car at the airport, drive off to the first destination and return the car at the airport I’m flying off from. If the pick-up and drop-off locations are different, check if a surcharge is levied and how much it is.
Fuss-free music
For music in the hotel room, we’re bringing along the Jabra Solemate portable speaker. Instead of lugging stacks of CDs around, simply download your favourite tracks onto an SD card and plug it into the Solemate.
What I like most is we can play our song collections and playlists wirelessly from our smartphones, tablet and Ultrabook via Bluetooth. It’s portable, easy to use and the sound quality is superb.
Finally, book the hotels. I know some Japanese so I used to browse Japanese booking websites and hotel websites directly, calling them on the phone for enquiries and reservations.
This time round, I discovered that my favourite accomodation-booking website for Europe holidays – booking.com – now has quite extensive list of hotels in Japan. Enough to find hotels that fit your budget in most places in Japan.
I like booking.com because of its clear information and easy booking. So even if you don’t know ANY japanese, you can still find and book accommodation easily.
Smartphones
We don’t use smartphones an awful lot, but for the record, we’re bringing along the Android Sony Xperia ion and an aging iPhone 3GS.
I’ve left the Nokia Lumia 900 at home because Nokia maps does not have the navigation map for Japan, and I’m renting an English GPS with the car anyway.
Another website that I tried last year – hotels.com – seems to be only beginning to move into Japan, with poor selection and high prices. I’m hoping there coverage and pricing will improve over time.
Once you’ve gotten the flight, car and hotel bookings out of the way, what remains is the physical packing for the big day.
