Welcome to our Japan guide (or: how to drag your kids around Japan and somehow love every minute)

Japan is the country that ruined us for everywhere else. We've come back more times than is probably reasonable, dragging Flo and Raf through neon-lit cities, mountain onsens, and ramen counters where they absolutely should not have been making that much noise.

This guide is the stuff we'd tell our friends over a beer — spots worth the detour, the ones the internet overhypes, and where to actually eat when you've got a hangry toddler at 4pm.

If a place is in here, we've been. If we loved it, we said so. If it was a disaster, we probably said that even louder.

Now go eat your weight in gyoza.

— Tina, Andy, Flo & Raf