Car Camping in Japan... where to rent a car?

[jake9115]

Hey guys,

I'm going back to Japan this summer (my 10th trip to Japan, yay anniversary) and want to see a lot of the country despite being a cheap, cheap man. My wife was telling me about something she called shanai haku (車中泊) which is simply sleeping in your car to avoid hotel costs. I'll be in Japan for the month of July, so it should be great driving weather with warm nights, and would really like to tour the country this way.

So, the problem is I am looking for a cheapo rent-a-car that has the type of foldable back seats made for sleeping in the back. I see that there are a bunch of 660cc "box" type cars that only run ~$60 per day from major companies like nippon rent-a-car, but can't tell if these have those folding seats.

Does anyone have experience with this or know where I can get an affordable car for this purpose? Also, any tricks for saving money on the road tolls? I seem to remember them being pretty steep.

Thanks guys! This forum was really helpful when I sought advice prior to my first J-trip in 2005.

[matsuki]

You can save on tolls by driving late at night (and also avoiding traffic) but why not love hotel it around Japan? Many of the inaka places have parking and you can "rest" there for a few hours with a shower and all that.

[GomiGirl]

For the cost of renting a car for a month, you could almost buy a cheap van from an auction place.

Second hand vans are super cheap here.

The just sell it back to the dealer you bought it from - or just give it back and you are still better off.

But second the love hotel option. They are everywhere in the country and have clean soft sheets and a bathroom for bathing. Summer gets pretty hot here.

[Coligny]

One thing that kills me is that all love hotels also include parking place...

Which is not always a defacto possibility for regular hotels... Even then, you usually need to reserve it and also pay more...

[wagyl]

With widespread experience I can confirm that yes you can sleep in the back of a 660cc one box van, and all the ones offered at rental places will be primarily for hauling loads rather than people so fold flat seats will be included. If you are over 180 cm in height you may have issues: ideally 175 cm would be comfortable. Depending on the maker, a 660cc one box will most likely have the front wheels right out the front which means that a very obtrusive wheelarch comes right where you want to put your right foot. These vehicles are not ergonomic. Further, the lower grade the trim, which is what you will likely come across at a rental, the worse the seats are. The cheap ones are maybe OK for going 3 Km to your rice paddy, but they are not OK for three hours on the road.

If you end up buying, I would recommend one with the front wheels under the front seats (getting rarer these days) and the highest grade commercial vehicle style trim. Some, but not all, of the passenger vehicle models tend to go a little too far on making the back seats nice which can mean that they don't end up going full flat.

Oh, and give that poor little engine lots of love, and be generous with the oil changes.

[Coligny]

Depends on the platform, minivans share plateforms with car in most lineup (bathtube chassis and all), you find bits of Renault Megane in most small medium Nissan road appliances. Basically tied to the engine group/transaxle setup.
Van meanwhile are usually front engine RWD and put the front seat on top of the engine himself on top of the front wheels some were body on frame. See Totoya Hiace/Nissan NV350, Mazda Bongo, Nissan Vanette (NOT the new NV200)

Until last year, Mitsu had the TownBox pop up camper

10402021_201105a.jpg

Seems Honda now fill the gap

mainimage.jpg

Seems he'll be in Japan for July only... So oil change and buying a car... wtf...
Same goes for sleeping in a car in japanese summer heat... Not sure even hobos would do this...

[wagyl]

To give an idea of what prices you can get a used 660cc van for http://www.carsensor.net/usedcar/bSZ/s0 ... ml?SORT=22 (sorted to give cheapest at the top of the list) which does put the cost of medium term renting into perspetive, but as a practical matter you will need to be registered to an address here, which is a fairly big inconvenience for a medium term tourist. Also, if your wife is the lady referred to in your previous posts and her parents are still at that address and if you think about using that address, the cost of renting a parking place, even if just for the purposes of getting the car registered, will likely be about the same as the car itself.

[kurogane]

Same goes for sleeping in a car in japanese summer heat... Not sure even hobos would do this...

Well, I was no hobo but I was homeless so I tried that. I have never slept so badly, and that was in an anime Kappa themed bottle green Largo/Vanette (Go Go Kappa-Go!!!!!!!!!) with a full sunroof, windows open, in the beach forest with a full proper futon setup. It is muderously difficult to find roadside spots with real shade, so you get to sleep almost comfortably from about 1:30 am to about 4 am, when the fucking sun comes up again because switching to daylight savings time would screw up the fucking bullet train schedule and reduce nightime drinking hours. After that, it's just a sweaty toss fest while you wait for the local Gusto to switch to their breakfast menu time.

I strongly recommend against the timing of the plan. October and November would actually be quite nice for it. Also, get a vehicle with a real engine: Keis are for housewives and homos. Any drive longer than an hour is a travesty.

But if you do drive in July, just stay at the country roadside love hotels. Any single or double digit highway will have plenty. They're like North American motels, but clean. And as Gomi Girl noted, they have bathrooms for bathing (unlike other bathroom equipped accommodation, presumably )

[Coligny]

(unlike other bathroom equipped accommodation, presumably )

in case of good food poisoning... any port in a storm d00d...

But integrated bathrooms were you can sit on the loo while still being able to vomit in the sink were a discovery that I miss dearly in the bunker...

[jake9115]

Hmmmm, good stuff so far. Thanks for the advice and suggestions.

So here's my take on all of this... First, I know July is probably a sucky month to sleep outside in a car (never thought of the sun rising so early, oh god the sun), but I have exactly this one month in between quitting my current job and starting med school to have some fun. So, it will be July.

Second, I am super broke. On previous trips I have used love hotels for their non-carnal purpose, and they were great places to stay the night. Clean, tricked-out bathrooms, comfy beds, they were great. But, they were still between $50-$90 per night, which makes a road trip too damn expensive. After searching around I found the best car rental deal on Tocoo! website, where I can get a 600cc car for 14 days for only $570. That seems like a helluva deal, but i need to make sure I can sleep in it.

On my previous visits to Japan (and yes, that jgirl I referred to is now my jwife) I always stuck around tokyo or other big cities connected by shinkansen. Only once did I rent a car and go exploring (to Nikko) but that was only a day trip. This time I'm bored of the city and want to see a shitload of beaches, mountains, plains, everything Japan has to offer, and I want to drink the local beers, dance at the matsuri's, all that crap. So I'm assuming the only way to do is by car.

My biggest problem is the rental places. That Tocoo! website promises a cheap fix, but it doesn't let you pick the exact make and model, just the car class, so I have no guarantee that the car will even be boxy-enough to allow me to sleep in it (I am about 180cm). I read a blog post somewhere about an ex-pat living in Japan who said that one day a couple visited him at his door and they were advertising a camping car rental service. So they rented the box-van type car that had perfectly flat folding back seats, and it came with a gas camping stove, sleeping blankets, that kind of shit. Anyone know of a service like that I could look into?

Thanks for all of the suggestions! And by the way, my posts from this account were not my first, I used to have another FG account that I used around 2005 but I lost my credentials and made this new one.

[Russell]

Lots of good memories from traveling by and sleeping in my car with my wife.

If you cannot adjust the season of travel, you may want to adjust the place. I never even tried to sleep in my car in July. Even at 4:00 AM, the coolest time of the day, it is hot. However, how about going around Hokkaido? Much more bearable in the summer, as I have heard (I do not have the personal experience). You may also want to consider selecting your overnight stays high in the mountains, if you can find proper places.

I have gone around Shikoku and Kinki in a Mitsubishi Minica with my wife on travels covering multiple weeks, but also for long weekends. Later we bought a Honda STPWGN with roof tent, which is great for kids.

Some general tips:

- Try to keep driving distances limited. Spending the whole day in your car is less fun than spending it on activities. If you have to drive distances through areas that are not so interesting, take the highway. Sucks with the high tolls in Japan, but your time is limited.

- Some road stations are great places to sleep. They are free and have all the facilities, like toilets. Avoid the ones where trucks stay overnight with idling motors. In the summer this will probably even be a bigger problem, because they have to keep their aircon going.

- Occasionally there are nice quiet parking places near beaches or in mountains with toilet facilities. These are the places you really want to be, but they have become more restricted due to people making noise, leaving trash, or damaging facilities.

- There are also out-of-season places you may be able to stay for free if none is around, but in July you are out of luck.

- A Keijidousha is small, so you will find yourself having to arrange and rearrange your luggage before sleeping and after sleeping. We found it convenient to have a net hanging inside the car just under the roof. Nowadays you can buy those I think, but in my young days I invented something myself. And, I never tried it, but I think a luggage rack on your roof would be very convenient.

- Though our Minica was small, I could sleep comfortably in it with my 185 cm length. The seats folded away neatly, and we put our luggage in front of the front seats, which effectively lengthened our beds by 20 cm. We did spread a double futon over the seats to even out all remaining bumps. In the morning we folded this futon backwards to free up our front seats for the day.

- It sucks when it rains. Rearranging all that luggage requires you to put some of it outside for a while, but that is not possible when it rains. In this case you may want to find a place to stay under some roof (viaduct, bridge, or roofed parking space).

- Lots of Onsens in Japan, so very convenient.

- Try to find a sleeping place by 16:00, because it sucks to do so when it is dark.

- It is cheapest to take your once-a-day warm meal as lunch, since many restaurants have a lunch menu. It is also convenient, because then at night you don't have to move for dinner. If you cannot survive on a sandwitch, onigiri, or cup noodles for dinner, you are out of luck.

- You need a thermos can and equipment to make hot water. We use a hot pot for occasions when there is power available in toilets (probably not legal), or some camping burner (which could be a gas burner or those convenient cans with burnable white paste inside).

- Oh, did I tell you that it sucks when it rains, so make sure not to travel in the rainy season.

Good luck and wish you lots of fun. The countryside of Japan is a treasure, and going autocamp will give you nice experiences. Like the time we were set up for the night in Shikoku and two police officers knocked on our car because they thought we were about to commit suicide. Surprise surprise when this tall gaijin came out. They offered us to camp at the parking lot of the local police station, but we didn't take the offer.

Ahhh, those times...

Edit: Now I think of it, I probably removed the back sides of the back seats, because they could not be fold back completely. I seem to recall they could be removed with some simple tools, and later reinstalled. Dunno whether this type of temporary rearrangements would be acceptable to a car rental company, though...

[GomiGirl]

You could pick up a super cheap tent and try some campsites too if you need to stretch out:
http://www.outdoorjapan.com/camping

Many campsites in Japan are free and have well maintained (usually) toilets. Showers are often coin -operated but then there are sentos and onsens all over the country to try out and enjoy.

Great advice from Russell regarding hearty and cheap lunches. 100yen cup noodles or onigiri will be your friend if you don't mind a l'l bit o' msg in your supper.

Am a tad envious actually - this sort of trip - done on the cheap before you start med school - with the new wife will be something that you will remember for a long time.

[GomiGirl]

My biggest problem is the rental places. That Tocoo! website promises a cheap fix, but it doesn't let you pick the exact make and model, just the car class, so I have no guarantee that the car will even be boxy-enough to allow me to sleep in it (I am about 180cm). I read a blog post somewhere about an ex-pat living in Japan who said that one day a couple visited him at his door and they were advertising a camping car rental service. So they rented the box-van type car that had perfectly flat folding back seats, and it came with a gas camping stove, sleeping blankets, that kind of shit. Anyone know of a service like that I could look into?

I found this site - is this what you mean?

http://www.hero-travel-spt.jp/our_vehicles.html

But the website is horrible and may not have been updated for a while.

[Coligny]

Hokkaido in summer is some ungodly furnace straight out of hell...

Some places in japan are like that (Tajimi and Verdun included) BRUTAL continental weather. We are talking -40 in winter +40 in summer.
I went to Noboribetsu few year ago... And between the sulphur smell the heat the geysers and the smoking acid lakes I thought I finally reached that point on medieval maps where the label states "there shall be dragons"

Russel you still have the popup on the stpwgn ? Any pics ?

[Russell]

Hokkaido in summer is some ungodly furnace straight out of hell...

Some places in japan are like that (Tajimi and Verdun included) BRUTAL continental weather. We are talking -40 in winter +40 in summer.
I went to Noboribetsu few year ago... And between the sulphur smell the heat the geysers and the smoking acid lakes I thought I finally reached that point on medieval maps where the label states "there shall be dragons"

Russel you still have the popup on the stpwgn ? Any pics ?

OK, maybe I should take back what I said about Hokkaido. It was mostly hearsay that it was cool up there in summer.

STPWGN with tent pics on the web:







My STPWGN is similar, except for the more numerous bumps and scratches.

Tent is nice, but if I had to choose again, I would buy a van with a high roof in which I would install a sleeping place, because I would be able to store futons there.

Also, when there is thunder, you don't want to sleep up there.

But the kids think it's fun.

[jake9115]

Oh man, so many good tips, I really appreciate it.

Russell, I'm really encouraged by your experience! Hearing that you have happy memories of doing this kind of trip with your wife is really all I need to hear. But then again all of your practical advise is super helpful too! Sure it's going to be hot as nuts and perhaps lumpy, but my wife and I are no strangers to roughing it and with everyone's suggestions I think things are looking really optimistic. Your post was so damn thorough! But how about safety/crime? I would love to find remote parks or nature areas to sleep at, but are there any safety concerns I should consider?

Hokkaido is seriously that hot?! I assumed it would be cool and comfy! Not sure what to do, i kinda thought about hitting up a dozen or so different parts of japan, some toward the deep south, and possibly as far north as Hokkaido. Does anyone have suggestions of their favorite places to see on this type of road trip?? I'm open to anything that isn't expensive, any kind of experience.

Hey Gomigirl, thanks for that link, that was pretty much exactly what I was looking for! After seeing the prices of the ultra-economy sites like Tocoo!, I might just call them up and ensure i get a boxy car, but if that doesn't work out sites like the one you provided will be perfect. Speaking of remembering this trip, oh christ, I have been working so long and so hard for this. I had shit grades in college (2.4 GPA) so I had to basically break my back for the last five years to get accepted into this M.D. program. So this is like a triumphant beginning of the second part of my life, and I can't think of a better way to kick things off than a cheap-ass road trip across Japan. My fondest memories are of the time my wife and I spent in Japan when dating like 8 years ago, but we've been too poor and studying too hard to return to Japan for the past 6 years, and I have literally been dreaming about going back.

[jake9115]

Russell, that van is a thing of beauty, hopefully I can find something similar for this summer!!

[jake9115]

Forgot to mention it, but I actually have a Kickstarter project related to my trip this summer if anyone wants to laugh at my amateur photography: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1975459220/tokyo-time-travel-observing-japans-age-through-abs. Sorry if the project description sounds pretentious, that sort of language seems to appeal to the average fine arts sponsor, lol

[Wage Slave]

Hokkaido in summer is some ungodly furnace straight out of hell...

Some places in japan are like that (Tajimi and Verdun included) BRUTAL continental weather. We are talking -40 in winter +40 in summer.

You what? I spent a summer working there offshore Abashiri many years ago and the weather was extremely pleasant if a touch chilly sometimes in May.

August is the hottest month in Hokkaido with an average temperature of 22°C (72°F) and the coldest is January at -4°C (25°F) with the most daily sunshine hours at 7 in May. The wettest month is September with an average of 171mm of rain. The best month to swim in the sea is in August when the average sea temperature is 22°C (72°F)

Average in July is 20. Average high is 23 average low 16. More or less perfect for car camping I would have said.

http://www.holiday-weather.com/hokkaido/averages/

[Russell]

Jake, that link of Gomigirl is indeed very good. This is the perfect camping car on a budget. It is definitely preferable over a non-prepared general boxy car.

Regarding safety, we have never had problems with it.

At night we leave windows open only slightly. Yeah, I know with that tent open on top it does not make sense. Anyway, we want to keep mosquitoes out.

I had once some local 茶髪 youth in a remote area setting off fire crackers near our car at 2:00 AM, but they stopped when I came out and told them people were trying to sleep. Japanese youth is usually 素直. And they were probably quite surprised when they saw me.

I have considered buying pepper spray for self-defense, but didn't do it in the end, because I figured it may escalate things rather than solve them. Also, you don't want your pepper spray to go off accidentally while driving. I look like a typical US soldier if I cut my hair short, so that may also protect me a bit.

Of course my positive experiences are no guarantee for the future, but I think Japan is pretty safe in this respect.

Good to hear I made you more enthusiastic. You will certainly look back to it in the future with a smile.

Oh, one more tip: many supermarkets have free ice to keep stuff cold. Very convenient for your cool box.

[Coligny]

Hokkaido in summer is some ungodly furnace straight out of hell...

Some places in japan are like that (Tajimi and Verdun included) BRUTAL continental weather. We are talking -40 in winter +40 in summer.

You what? I spent a summer working there offshore Abashiri many years ago and the weather was extremely pleasant if a touch chilly sometimes in May.

August is the hottest month in Hokkaido with an average temperature of 22°C (72°F) and the coldest is January at -4°C (25°F) with the most daily sunshine hours at 7 in May. The wettest month is September with an average of 171mm of rain. The best month to swim in the sea is in August when the average sea temperature is 22°C (72°F)

Average in July is 20. Average high is 23 average low 16. More or less perfect for car camping I would have said.

http://www.holiday-weather.com/hokkaido/averages/

Noboribetsu, south of Hokkaido, nearly died there... Now, there might be more liveable parts near Vladivostock...

[Wage Slave]

Noboribetsu, south of Hokkaido, nearly died there... Now, there might be more liveable parts near Vladivostock...

Or Sapporo

[Mock Cockpit]

You can easily replicate expected conditions for a jolly jape in a kei in July. Go into your shithouse with a humidifier and a bar heater. Put your mattress down but get a foot piece of 4"x2" and place it crossways level with your kidneys. Then get 2 packs of natto, put one on the bar heater and the other on the humidifier shut the door and stay there for eight hours.

[kurogane]

Wow. That was epically evocative. You certainly captured my Summer from Hell experience. Did I mention that it was the first summer since records started when the Monsoon Season didn't enjoy an announced end? Oh............the sweat............the sweat.................

Seriously, OP: it all sounds like a great plan, and I am sure we get the limitations on finances, etc...........but don't do it.

Mind, a nice well vented tent could be an option (say 15,000 yen on Rakuten or Amazon), as you could actually make use of available shade in the seaside berms (the barrier forests). Those public and often free campsites actually often have nice facilities, but they are notoriously free of shady camp spots, and often forbid pitching your tent in or near the trees. That would also enable you to rent an ultra cheap car.

[Russell]

Kurogane, he doesn't need shady spots, since he will only sleep in his car at night.

That said, even then it will be fucking hot in the summer.

[kurogane]

Well, 'night' does end when the sunrises at about 3:45 to 4 am in the summer, so unless they want to live the full peasant sunrise to sunset existence shade couldn't hurt.............and in rural areas nothing opens until 8 or even 9 am, which leaves a long time to sit and sweat. Shade or no, I'm with you and everybody else: car camping in the summer in Japan = death by slow sweaty melt. You guys probably do a weekend jaunt don't you? The OP seems to be talking about weeks or a month. I did it from late May until early October, and it was only in the last week of it that it was remotely comfortable. And that was in a much bigger vehicle with proper airflow.

My Summer of Sweat was in 1998, though, when smaller towns had no Convenience Stores and even rural Gusto type restaraunts closed. I suppose one could actually just get up early and then go to an air conditioned restaraunt to cool off a bit.

FTR, I fully get the romance of the idea, but not in mid-summer. I actually plan to do it one of these days. But not in mid-summer

[Coligny]

FTR, I fully get the romance of the idea, but not in mid-summer. )

Are you sure you wanted to use "romance" in this sentence...

Try promiscuity... The kind that ends up with someone dead and someone crazy...

[Yokohammer]

... I did it from late May until early October, and it was only in the last week of it that it was remotely comfortable. And that was in a much bigger vehicle with proper airflow.

But you persevered for the whole 4~5 months. There must have been something in it.

Character building, perhaps? Or simply a matter of no rent money?

Whatever, I say let the young-uns build their memories while they can. Good or bad.

[jake9115]

So balls hot everything sounds bad, but given everyone's suggestions I think my wife and I will try a shorter (4-5 day) road trip first, gauge how things are going, and then decide what to do from there. But I am still really looking forward to the trip (more than ever, actually), as >90% of all of my time spent in Japan was in Tokyo, and the countryside just sounds so much more appealing.

Ya'll have any favorite spots that would make good road-tripping destinations? I really don't know shit about where to go, so I was just going to check out some guide books and let the road decide. I'm looking for things that are off the beaten path and rewarding. Btw, i'm not that much of a young-in, wifey and I are almost 30 and we've been together for 10 years!

[Coligny]

Maybe you can rough it up as a zombapocalypse/prepper/survival trip surviving on beef jerky, hunting rats or squirrels, filtering puddle rainwater and bashing skulls of the locals with a sharpened shovel...