How we research Japan

Not all Japan travel information is published fully — or promptly — in English. Japanese venue pages may contain more detailed booking rules, seasonal announcements, age restrictions, closure dates, access instructions and family facilities than their English equivalents. Researching those sources helps us find useful details and experiences that can be missed when a guide relies only on English-language travel articles.

Japanese-language sources can surface:

• Local and less-publicised family activities
• Current operating notices
• Ticket-release schedules
• Age, height and participation restrictions
• Holiday and seasonal closures
• Transport and access details
• Japanese room descriptions and occupancy rules
• Family facilities, pram access and changing facilities
• Local booking requirements
• Information that has not yet appeared on English-language pages

A Japanese source isn’t automatically correct, though — pages go out of date like any other. So we treat what we find as a lead to confirm, and cross-check important claims rather than assuming they’re current.

We prioritise sources roughly in this order:

1. Official venue, hotel, transport-operator or attraction websites
2. Official Japanese government, prefectural, municipal and tourism sources
3. Official booking platforms and operator announcements
4. Direct firsthand experience
5. Reputable Japanese family-travel and local publications
6. Reputable English-language sources
7. User feedback that can subsequently be verified

We do not treat another travel blog as proof of a fact. Wherever practical, important details are traced back to a primary or official source.

1. Identify an activity, destination, hotel or travel question.
2. Locate its official Japanese and English information where available.
3. Compare important details across the sources.
4. Check booking requirements, prices, operating dates and restrictions.
5. Assess the information from a family perspective.
6. Record the source and the date checked in our database.
7. Use that database across destination pages, articles and the itinerary planner.
8. Flag uncertain or conflicting information rather than guessing.
9. Recheck time-sensitive information on a scheduled basis.

Translation tools may assist with Japanese-language research, but important information is interpreted carefully and cross-checked against the official source — we don’t rely on a machine translation alone for a detail a family will book around.

A venue being popular doesn’t automatically make it suitable for every family. For each one we ask:

• What ages is it genuinely suitable for?
• Are there age, height or participation restrictions?
• How much time should a family allow?
• Is advance booking necessary?
• How difficult is it to reach with children?
• Is it pram- or wheelchair-accessible?
• Are there toilets, changing facilities and places to rest?
• Is it suitable for a rainy or extremely hot day?
• Are there nearby food options for children?
• Can it be combined sensibly with other activities?
• Is it worth the price for a family?
• Is it likely to create an exhausting or unrealistic itinerary?

This information doesn’t sit separately in an article archive. Where appropriate it is structured in our database and used to create more realistic family itineraries.

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We clearly distinguish between places experienced firsthand and recommendations based on careful editorial research. We do not pretend to have personally visited every hotel, attraction or neighbourhood featured on Small Steps Japan.

• “Visited by us” — personally experienced by the Small Steps Japan team.
• “Editorially researched” — researched using current primary and reputable sources.
• “Community tip — verified” — suggested by a reader and subsequently checked.

We only show a label when our database holds evidence supporting it.

Prices, operating hours, booking systems and entry requirements can change without warning. We provide a “last checked” date where practical, link to official sources, and encourage travellers to confirm critical details before booking or travelling. In practice:

• Prices include their currency and verification date.
• Seasonal information includes the period it applies to.
• Temporary closures are not presented as permanent.
• Unconfirmed rumours or social-media posts are not treated as facts.
• The latest official venue information takes priority.

Despite careful research, travel information changes and mistakes can happen. We welcome corrections from travellers and operators. Substantive corrections are checked before publication and recorded internally so the same error doesn’t reappear elsewhere on the site.

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Some links on Small Steps Japan are affiliate links. If a reader books through one of these links, we may receive a commission at no additional cost to them. Affiliate availability does not determine whether an activity, hotel or destination is included or recommended.

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Small Steps Japan was founded by Nick Henderson. It grows out of more than 20 years of travelling Japan — including his own family trips with children — and a research approach that checks official Japanese-language sources, not just English travel blogs. Nick started Small Steps Japan to give Australian families the specific, honest, up-to-date planning help he wished he’d had.

Our research combines those primary Japanese and English sources with firsthand family travel, structured into a database so the same verified facts drive our destination pages, articles and the itinerary planner.

Our goal is simple: to help families spend less time sorting through conflicting information and more time planning a Japan trip that will actually work for them.

We only publish biographical claims we can stand behind. If you’d like more detail about Nick’s background here, tell us what you’re comfortable sharing and we’ll add it.