Note that all the below is for the Kansai region. YMMV elsewhere.

There should be somewhat-cheap hostels in various cities. I didn’t stay at hotels in Kyoto when I was there in December (as I was staying with friends), but I remember seeing places advertising for around 6000 Yen, or 80 USD/night, which didn’t seem outrageous. Hostels are probably cheaper still.

Money is a pain. I tried 3 ways of getting yen. I took some cash with me, and exchanged it at the airport. There was approximately a 4% fee for doing this. I used my credit card; there was a 1% fee for doing this. And I used an ATM (look for 7-11, most/all US ATM cards should work there); there were three fees for this, totaling around 4%. Needless to say, use your credit card whenever possible (but not all places that accept cards will accept US cards). And, as noted above, the exchange rate sucks. Take any number in Yen, divide by 100, and increase by a third (i.e., 6000 Yen –> approx. $80) for everyday use.

Most shrines/temples were free. Some had a nominal fee, usually 300-500 Yen. The most I saw was 1000 Yen, though that included tea, and was technically a garden. Food prices were not unreasonable (compared to the US).

Train prices are dirt-cheap compared to how much it costs to get around in other countries by car. The Seishun 18 ticket (http://wikitravel.org/en/Seishun_18_Ticket) can be awesomely cheap, though note that it’s only for JR lines, and that there are many rail operators out there besides JR. Also, at least in the Kansai region, there was a card you could buy that essentially functioned as a debit card for rail use; once you bought it, you could just add money to it, and didn’t have to buy individual tickets for each trip. And it worked for all train operators. And at the end of your trip, if you talk to JR at the airport, they’ll even give you back your 500 Yen deposit and any money you have left on the card. This is really awesome, and I recommend that you get one ASAP.

For flights, I think Koichi has a decent summary: http://www.tofugu.com/2010/11/16/how-to-get-cheap-airplane-tickets-to-japan/ There should be a place at the airport to ship your bags to your destination, if needed. I did this when flying in to Osaka (KIX) and then staying in Kyoto; I think it cost around $40 for two (large) suitcases.

Note that, for the most part, signs are in Japanese. I repeat: signs are in Japanese. Unless you’re relatively far along in your studies, don’t expect to be able to read much of the historical background signs at temples/shrines/museums/etc. My wife (native) could read them no problem, my other two friends (one has lived in Japan for 3 years, the other has been there 9 months, both also studied in the US) can get by on the trains and the like, but were also mostly lost at temples/shrines/museums. For myself, 6 months into Textfugu and 4 months more into RTK, I could read the occasional word (and recognize many of the kanji), but that was about it. Note that I’m slower than most other learners, though, due to being an old fogey and not getting school breaks. Trains stations (well, airports too) are about the only exception, you don’t absolutely need Japanese for trains (though it doesn’t hurt). But most temples/shrines/museums will have a one-sentence (at most) explanation for each item of interest in English with a wall-of-text in Japanese, and most do not have English tours (though a couple did have English audio tours).

And, as always, Wikitravel is your friend.

Wow I didn’t spot this thread… forum is swamped with introductions at the moment.
It’s gonna be a long time before I can afford to go there, but I’ve already been planning/reading up on everything I’d need to know.

Question though…
I’ve been toying with the idea of doing a trip which half consisted of a guided tour (maybe a week), and the rest of the time (another week or more) spent exploring by myself.
The tours I liked were a wee bit expensive, but took you to so many amazing places. There was a lot of free time to wander about by yourself, but the main thing I liked the idea of, was having somebody pointing me in the right direction all the time. One thing I’m scared of, is going to Japan and missing out on so many amazing places/things, just because I got lost, or didn’t even realise they existed. Some things on the tour I wouldn’t know where to begin arranging by myself.

Does anyone else think this sort of thing would be worthwhile? Or just a monumental waste of money? I’m very undecided, and skeptical about my own skills as a trip planner!

That also brings up another question… what would be everyones expected budget for a Japan visit? Excluding flights, as that would vary depending where you’re all from! Joel, you said you spent $AUS 3333, did you expect to spend that much/more/less?

Joel, you said you spent $AUS 3333, did you expect to spend that much/more/less?

I couldn’t really say, to be honest. I don’t think we ever really had a budget in mind.

We went there basically knowing exactly how much the hotels were going to cost, and having already paid for the airfares and JR Pass. We made an educated guess for how much our day-to-day expenses would be, and went with that. I wound up going to a 711 ATM on the very first night we arrived because I spent like a quarter of the cash I’d brought with me on the taxi that we caught when we thought we’d missed the last train for the day. With that money, plus $US 500 my grandparents gave me, I wound up spending about ¥4500 per day, and took home a little over ¥22,000.

To be fair, though – and to address missingno’s concerns of overestimating, we didn’t go there to shop. I think we each spent maybe ¥10,000 or thereabouts on souvenirs and that was pretty much it, so I guess if you’re planning on shopping, you can crank the estimate up a bit. Also, the Aussie dollar was pretty strong against the US dollar at the time (though not as strong as it was when I went to America in November =P) so we were getting something in the range of 82 to 85 yen to the dollar. I don’t honestly recall the exchange rate exactly.

Speaking of money, if its alright with you, where you guys working at?

I’m not. Been broke since I got back from America, aha, aha.

This thread is great!
I’m planning on studying abroad in Japan, either next Fall or Spring. Haven’t decided exactly when I’m going, but it would be nice to see the cherry blossoms in bloom!