You can be soaking in a hot spring within half an hour of landing, then eating a pepper bun on a street corner within the hour, and you'll be planning your return by midnight.
Getting your bearings
The city makes more sense once you stop thinking about the centre and begin thinking in terms of neighbourhoods. Each has its own rhythm, its own good bakery and its own strongly held views on the others. Pick one as your base, and get to know it thoroughly before you stray.
People will walk you to the right bus stop, then wave as you go.
Where to eat
Eat where the lunch crowd is eating, particularly if they appear to be on a break from somewhere nearby. The set lunch is the best value in town, and it often comes from the very same kitchen that charges three times the price for a similar dish after dark.
What locals want you to know
Public transport is excellent and inexpensive, and you can usually pay with a tap of your card. Bicycles are easy to hire and the riverside route is the best way to get a feel for the place. Taxis are rarely necessary, unless it is two in the morning or you are lost.
Be considerate. People live here, and they would like to carry on doing so. Keep voices down in residential streets at night, learn how to say please and thank you, and try to spend your money at places that are owned locally. Everything goes better with a little courtesy.
