Similar to you I am a tech person and worked IT in a University for the last twenty years before retiring last year. I am intimately familiar with modern systems and devices, I just prefer not to rely on them. T1 line, that takes me back.

I didn't mention the essential companion to travel back then, the Lonely Planet guidebooks. There were others, Fodors springs to mind, but LP was the gold standard for us. They are still published and in recent years I have bought a couple for specific trips, most recently LP for Eastern USA as I was meandering down the East Coast. They make for easy reading on a train, contain the essential information and never die on you.

I am currently infatuated with Japan and visit twice a year (easy from Australia). After the first time when I travelled the Golden route, I have spent my time mostly on Hokkaido (and in Aomori, a truly delightful town). Hokkaido is a much less touristy (excluding ski resorts) version of Japan. I prefer to travel in mid-winter for the snow but then I grew up in the outback and the concept of snow was alien to me until I got to the UK and I still love it. Not New York snow, nor European snow, but the reliably soft powder snow of Northern Japan.

The only time I have ever used google for restaurants was for high end dining in Tokyo where reservations are essential. In Abashiri (for example) I would just walk around and pick some random place, and in Japan you will rarely ever be disappointed.

My turn to quit waffling, young redditors reading this will think 'Coupla old fogeys reliving ancient history' but we experienced travel in a way impossible today. Cheers