How we research

Some pages on this site carry a researched depth layer — the sections with tables of booking windows, drive times, opening seasons and visitor statistics. This page explains where those numbers come from, so you can judge whether to trust them.

Primary sources only

Every figure in a depth layer was read off a primary source: operator timetables and booking portals, municipal ordinances, prefectural orders, regional tourism boards, national statistics offices, and airline schedules. Where only a secondary source existed, the prose says so in place. Claims we could not verify were left out rather than softened.

Dated checks

Each researched page states the date its sources were last read, and lists them at the bottom. Beach caps, fees, ferry timetables and opening seasons are set annually — treat anything seasonal as worth a re-check before you travel, whatever the check date says.

What we deliberately leave out

Current prices, above all. Dinner, hotel and car-hire rates move faster than we could keep them accurate, and a stale price is worse than none — so researched pages compare what a destination costs in effort, access and crowding instead, and describe budget structurally (whether a cheap tier exists at all) rather than in day-rates.

Who does this

The research is done and maintained by Dmitrii Romashchin. Corrections are genuinely welcome — if a cap, fee, date or timetable on a researched page is wrong or has changed, write to hey@wherebest.now and it will be checked against the source and fixed.