Ryokans are usually priced lower Sun-Th than Fri & Sat night, too. Some of the smaller ones do close a day or two per week, though.

I wish I'd opted in to taxi usage earlier in repeat trips and do advise "less advanced" friends traveling this summer with families to use JP taxi (app) to conserve energy, especially in the humidity & golden triangle tourism peak periods. I also don't know if it is where I want to go (less touristed areas) but public transit and google/navitime local bus schedules seem less available/frequent now than they were in say 2017. I wouldn't be surprised if some of the public transit workforce retired in addition to the taxi driver shortage which was already there pre-Covid or opted to retire early/transition to jobs with less customer interaction.