Trouble ridden summer holiday in Japan

Small problems and some stressful situations are completely common during travel. Being a budget traveler, I’ve had dozens of small travel problems like that, but I have never had so many in one single journey like we did in summer 2019 in Japan.

In this blog, I’m going to write about each problem and lessons I am taking from each situation.

Trouble 1: Airbnb double booking (Fukuoka)

We left Dusseldorf Germany, then flew into Abu Dhabi, then to Seoul, then to Fukuoka Japan.

We were very happy to have finally arrived in Kyushu island, enjoyed really good coffee near Hakata station, didn’t enjoy the Tomato ramen that much, but at around 9pm, reached our Airbnb feeling excited about exploring Fukuoka starting tomorrow. I opened the key box and …

there was no key.

This was first, but I was still optimistic at this point. I thought that the owner will bring the key to us – simple. But it wasn’t that simple, it went something like this:

I called the property’s emergency number but a person on the phone was reluctant to send anyone and they did just that – not sending anyone. Eventually I walked to their office and they finally sent someone, a cleaning person, to the property, only to find out that the room was already occupied – this was past 11pm. Using the cleaning person’s mobile phone I told the manager that we’re staying in a hotel and they are paying. When we finally found and checked in at a hotel it was 1am.

There were further hiccups and stressful situations with this company, but they did pay for our hotel. They were being dishonest about a full-refund, but after contacting airbnb I received a full-refund. We did end up staying in a much nicer place for 3 nights for free, but this experience really spoiled the first evening of our holiday.

Lesson learnt: Perhaps stick to ‘super hosts’ when using airbnb. Price and location matter, but at the end of the day, having a decent and honest host is the most important thing. Also, contact with your airbnb host only via airbnb. After the double booking fiasco, the company asked if we can continue our conversations via e-mails, I declined. Later when I realised that the company did not process my refund, airbnb stepped in, read my conversation with the host and they dealt with the issue immediately.

Trouble 2: Lost in translation (Kyoto airbnb)

After Fukuoka, we went to Nagasaki, Kumamoto, Kagoshima then Beppu. After Beppu we were going to Kyoto, but I was just not getting clear check-in information from the Kyoto airbnb host. They didn’t speak Japanese and English was below conversation level. My guess was they only spoke Chinese.

Once again, airbnb stepped in, full refund was given and a voucher to support the payment for an alternative property was issued (this part, I have to say, was not that straightforward). The only problem was that it all happened the night before we were leaving for Kyoto.

And there was a large typhoon approaching…

Lesson learnt: Same as last one, probably better off sticking to super hosts. I have also learnt the importance of good wifi. Although we really enjoyed staying at our Beppu airbnb, their portable wifi was SLOW. I mean, really, slow. This added a whole new extra layer of nightmare to my Kyoto airbnb problem because it was just impossible to search for a new place to stay!

Trouble 3: Typhoon Krosa

Same time I was dealing with the Kyoto airbnb problem, a powerful typhoon Krosa was approaching western Japan. I was trying to pay attention to TV news whilst communicating with airbnb on my iPad – it was all mad. I had a sleepless night fighting with slow wifi and thinking how best to deal with the arrival of the typhoon.

I woke up C and C’s mum at 6am the next day and told them that maybe we should go to Kyoto today instead of tomorrow as there was a possibility of our bullet train not running tomorrow. Leaving today of course meant ditching today’s plan and paying for tonight’s accommodation on top of what we already paid for the Beppu accommodation for this evening. But we all felt getting to Kyoto as soon as and whilst we can was the wise thing to do.

So we packed our suitcases, headed to the station and got the next train/s to Kyoto. I searched and booked our Kyoto accommodation literally during our transit. Station/train wifi was much better than Beppu airbnb’s and yes, this time I used the ‘super hosts only’ filter.

Lesson learnt: I’m not usually a weather-checking type, but I should start paying a bit more attention during travel from now on. We can’t do anything about the weather, but I’m glad we made a very quick and wise decision as our train to Kyoto in fact did not run all day the next day. The annoying situation with our original Kyoto airbnb actually turned out to be quite lucky as we could stay at the same place for 4 nights rather than having to move after the first evening.

Trouble 4: I can not go back to London today? (Missing Eurostar train)

We had a great time in Japan, but this time it was just filled with so many problems and at the end I was just keen to be home. As we flew back into Dusseldorf Germany, I was going to take a 17:43 train from Cologne to London. I have done this train journey so many times before, and for the very first time, ever, my train was delayed, by 50 minutes. Problem was that I needed to change to the last Eurostar train to London at Brussels.

I knew my chance of getting the Eurostar train was slim, so I went to the Deutsche Bahn office in the station and asked what was going to happen. They told me to take my train to Brussels anyways, and once I’m there, next morning’s Eurostar and the accommodation for the night will be arranged. And that was exactly what happened.

Lesson learnt: Eurostar’s efficiency. I was highly impressed with the way the Eurostar handled the situation. There were about 50-60 of us and Eurostar was expecting us at their counter in Brussels. No questions asked apart from where I wanted to sit on the train tomorrow. Both my next morning’s train and hotel for the night were arranged immediately and without any hassle.

Final thoughts

C and I are not at all new to small travel troubles like these and we usually kind of just quickly deal with it and laugh about it. This time they just came in waves one after another. Two airbnb issues really did take so much of my time and attentions. The amount of time I spent on airbnb app, contacting hosts, contacting airbnb, waiting for replies, wondering and worrying, was just ridiculous. It was stressful.

The situation with the missed Eurostar was something I would normally just enjoy (nice hotel room and free breakfast, what’s not to like!?), but this time, that really was the last straw for me.

However, at the end of the day, all three of us stayed well and healthy throughout the journey and we returned home safely, and I should be truly grateful for that. I guess I always look for and want more, and perhaps this year’s trouble filled journey was a reminder for me to step back a little, and see beyond my own needs, and become humble, and of course, to always use the super-host filter when booking airbnb.

Thank you for reading my blog. Now it’s time for some freebies: