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Practical tips include pre-booking a wireless router and a JR Rail Pass Many of the foreigner-only discounts and services can only be reserved outside of Japan Download recommended apps for smoother travel

Japan isn't a country to which you just show up and wing it.

For foreigners, the language barrier can be intense, the technology overwhelming and the prices terrifying for just about everything other than instant ramen.

The key is preparation.

We've taken care a lot of that for you with the tips below, leaving you to puzzle out the fun stuff, like getting out of a karaoke bar with your dignity intact and figuring out how to ask them to hold the katsuobushi at breakfast.

Getting a prepaid SIM card with local calling service is difficult in Japan.

It's better to rent a handy little wireless router, known as "pocket Wi-Fi" in Asia.

This will allow multiple gadgets -- smartphone, laptop, ... Read more »

5 Easy Travel Hair Styles for Your Next Trip!

Taming and styling your locks takes a little extra effort when you re on a trip, but these easy travel hair styles, will help make it a breeze. While a travel sized hair styling tool is okay for vacations and holidays, it’s nice to have a minimalist travel style while you’re on the road, especially for longer trips such as Round-the-World trips .

Hair Accessories Needed

Black Headband Leatherette / Styling Mesh Chignon Bun Maker ... Read more »

5 Best Travel Reward Credit Cards

Wise Bread Picks

There are few things as alluring as the promise of free travel to exotic destinations. The banks know this, and have long offered travel rewards to their customers for using their credit cards. In turn, savvy credit card users maximize their rewards to travel in comfort and style well beyond their means. (See also: How Travel Rewards Credit Cards Really Work )

Recently, I was explaining this to an European executive sitting next to me in Lufthansa's Airbus A380 business class while returning home from a vacation in Italy. I told him that my family and I could not possibly have paid for our three $7,000 tickets for this flight. But thanks to my travel rewards credit cards, my journey was all but free after some taxes and fees. Through careful selection and use o ... Read more »

10 Best Bargain-Priced Family Vacations

For our readers with kids (those fortunate folks!), Budget Travel has asked America's foremost expert on family travel to select what she regards as the top budget-priced family vacations for the year ahead. She's responded not simply with names but with prices, addresses, and phone numbers for snaring a reservation without further ado. At the start of a new year, it's appropriate that we should select prize-winning family vacations available throughout the year, in every season. Though we may highlight an especially low price available only during one season, each of the vacations we've described below is offered at reasonable rates in all 12 months.

Our choices fall into 10 basic categories and number around 30 different specific programs, resorts, or facilities. The envelope, please, and the winners are.

1. Family camps

They are a way to have some fun in the woods, watch the leaves ... Read more »

Understand [ edit ]

Although Miami is the second most populous city in Florida, the Miami metropolitan area is the largest in the state with an estimated population of over 5.4 million (2007), which makes it the 7th most populous metro area in the United States. Due to being sandwiched in by the Atlantic Ocean to the east and the Everglades wetland area to the west, the Miami metropolitan area is a lengthy 110 miles (180km) north to south, but never more than 20 miles (32km) east to west.

History [ edit ]

Flagler’s railroad sparked a wave of expansion in areas such as Miami Beach, Homestead and Cutler. Soon after the railroad was built, the Overseas Highway was created. This highway connected the Florida Keys to the mainland. Growth and progress in Miami continued through World War I as well as into the mid-1920s.

A devastating hurricane in 1926 halted Miami’s growth and temporarily put the city, as well as Miami Beach, in a recession. ... Read more »