The Japan Spreadsheet

My Japan spreadsheet is pretty cool, and it covers all the important information. Across the board it covers:

1. Date
2. Time of Travel
3. Hotel
4. Cost
5. Destinations
6. Costs

This all gets looped together into a vertical version of the sheet, which is easier to read on a mobile device on the go, I won't show the full vertical sheet, because that information is already covered above, and would take up the majority of this post, so this is just for the idea:

• The items highlighted by a green border means there's a pre-booked ticket that is on a time schedule.
• All flights are listed with the flight number and takeoff time 🛫.
• The item highlighted with the big red question mark❓means the ticket is pending and I won't know until the day of arrival if the voucher goes through. (If not, it triggers an auto-refund).
• Tokyo Tower and Tokyo Skytree are limited to days the sun ☀️ is out, they close for inclement weather. 
• Hakone being fairly spread out and requiring busses means I should only run about if time allows, because I need to arrive at the Ryokan on time ⏰.
• Destinations with their cost is listed in blue text refer to the item as being paid in advance, and will be counted in the final budget, but for now are there as reference.
• Instead of listing hotels with multiple night stays in their per day costs, they're only written in their total cost.

All of the cost information is then grabbed by a sub-sheet which covers costs and overall budget:

• This sheet covers the total cost of the trip against my initial budget of $5397, hence why it basically points out I'll have $1725 in spending money, and not $2,100. 
• Kept the 10 Day Budget in as a reference point
• Covers all travel time from city to city, which averages to 96 minutes per day (which is less time than my round trip to and from work!).
• Hotel final costs, Flights, Train and WiFi all covered.
• Pre purchased destinations in blue text are not double counted, but just reference I already paid for them.
• The trip's final cost divided by 21 gives us the per day final total.
• Some of the information on this sheet is not 100% correct to the original, which I'll cover in some future posts in detail, but I did have to change around what days I was where and how much it cost.

My general ease of use for the spreadsheet is simple, if I buy something on my credit cards, I can add that to the list for costs. I don't need to do this for cash, because I can just subtract the money I have left over from my starting cash amount and that will give me one simple figure. If I go to Japan with $1,000 cash and I arrive back home with $141, I spent $859, done! No need to waste time telling the spreadsheet I bought a soda from a vending machine for $1.

This spreadsheet was updated 100 times before I left, and I didn't edit it at all during the trip. As for during the trip, it was mostly used for reference the places I researched in advance if I needed helpful reminders of where to go, or optimize my route through a city.

Spreadsheets are wonderful!

-Joe