Japan

En magisk temapark full med inslag från den hyllade animationsstudions allra mest älskade karaktärer ska öppna i närheten av staden Nagoya.

The southernmost big city on Japan's main islands, sunny Kagoshima (鹿児島) has a personality to match its climate and has been voted Japan's friendliest city nationwide. It's proud of its past as capital of the feudal Satsuma province, which holds an outsize place in Japanese history. Kagoshima's backdrop/deity is Sakurajima, a very active volcano just across the bay. Locals raise their umbrellas against the mountain's recurrent eruptions, when fine ash coats the landscape like snow and obscures the sun like fog – mystical and captivating.

Shibuya, the heart of Tokyo's youth culture, hits you over the head with its sheer presence: the continuous flow of people, the glowing video screens and the tangible buzz. All of this is summed up by its top attraction, Shibuya Crossing. It's a neighbourhood that is currently undergoing a massive transformation, evidenced by new developments like Shibuya Stream. A short train ride away, Shimo-Kitazawa offers an alternative vision of Tokyo: what it might look like if hippies – not bureaucrats – ran the city.

At the far southwestern end of the Southwest Islands are the gorgeous Yaeyama Islands (八重山諸島; Yaeyama-shotō), which include the main islands of Ishigaki-jima and Iriomote-jima as well as a spread of 17 isles. Located near the Tropic of Cancer, they are renowned for their lovely beaches, superb diving and lush landscapes.

I Japan är de duktiga på att blanda modern teknik med historia. Detta märks inte minst på det nya tåget "Kyotrain Garaku".

Offering serene onsen, world-class art museums, traditional inns and spectacular mountain scenery crowned by Mt Fuji, Hakone (箱根) can make for a blissful escape from Tokyo. Ashino-ko (芦ノ湖) is the lake at the centre of it all, the setting for the iconic image of Mt Fuji with the torii of Hakone-jinja rising from the water.

Det finns två pilgrimsleder i världen som är klassade som världsarv av Unesco. Den ena är superkändisen Camino De Santiago i Spanien, men har du hört talas om Kumano Kodo i Japan? Pilgrimsleden går genom Wakayama – en region som nyligen framröstats av Lonely Planets läsare till världens mest hållbara destination 2021.

Hokkaidō (北海道) is the Japan of wide-open spaces, with 20% of the country's land area but only 5% of its population. There are large swathes of wilderness here, with primeval forests, tropical-blue caldera lakes, fields of alpine wildflowers and bubbling, in-the-rough hot springs. In the summer, all this (plus the cooler, drier weather) draws hikers, cyclists and strollers.

Dominated by the eponymous Kyoto Station, this neighborhood serves as the gateway to Kyoto. There are a couple of worthwhile temples within walking distance of the station, and the excellent Kyoto Railway Museum is a short bus ride away. Venture further south and you'll come to one of the city's most stunning attractions, the Shintō shrine complex Fushimi Inari-Taisha, as well as the superb Tōfuku-ji temple and garden.

It's both unfortunate and important that the name Nagasaki (長崎) is synonymous with the dropping of the second atomic bomb. This history undeniably overshadows everything else, yet if that's all you experience during your visit you'll be missing the point. As paradoxical as it may seem, Nagasaki is vibrant and charming, and it begs to be explored far beyond the bomb museums, monuments and memorials.