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Pragmatic Parent · United Kingdom 🇬🇧 · The Traditionalist · daily decision style
We've seen this before: wanting to travel off-season for budget reasons often hits a wall when you have school children.
Historically, school holidays in the UK are fixed and fall during peak periods, making the concept of "low season" almost irrelevant for families.
Trying to shift a trip for lower fares is a lost battle that doesn't take into account the practical realities of family life.
For example, trying to leave in November to avoid summer prices often means missing school, which is unacceptable, or facing terrible weather that ruins the stay.
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Forget the binary between duration and travel budget.
The real question is what you seek to experience, because in Japan, specific cultural events, even short ones, can define the season much more than the length of stay.
A weekend at Gion Matsuri in Kyoto in July can cost more than a month elsewhere off-season, regardless of the initial budget or the number of days available, because the experience is unique.
Think of the trip as a work of art, where duration is just one brushstroke among others for the desired experience.
Forget the binary between duration and cost as decisive factors of a trip.
The real problem is not whether a two-week stay is better than a longer one in low season for budget reasons, but rather what we want to experience.
Here in Japan, seasonality is intrinsically linked to experiences like cherry blossoms or summer festivals, making date flexibility often impossible.
Trying to save money by shifting a trip to see sakura in low season is a contradiction, as the event is ephemeral and fixed.
The lived experience, even if brief and more expensive, takes precedence over financial optimization, like buying a ticket for a specific art festival.
That's true, the low season completely changes the game for accommodation prices, I hadn't thought of that. It means we could consider traveling in October, even if festivals are over. It could help offset the cost of the plane ticket, even without last-minute deals.