MichalFKowalik

Hello Flyertalkers,

This year we’re planning to visit Japan, and since it’s our first time there I rather stay on the safe mode and check if my itinerary looks reasonable.

I did my homework before, checked few good threads:
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/japan...ry-advice.html
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/japan...ry-advice.html
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/japan...-progress.html
as well as basic info from Master Thread / Wikipedia / Printed Guides.

Few notes before I sketch the timelines
- We’re going in three (all around 30 years old) and we are pretty “active tourists” – we did similar schedules in China and US East Coast within past two years
- We are into good food, intensive sightseeing, frequent traveling. We rather skip museums and we avoid partying (that’s what we do during biz trips )
- I’m interested in everything about nuclear energy – visited Chernobyl last year, planning Los Alamos next year (you’ll see both Nagasaki and Hiroshima below)
- Yes, I know we’re asking for trouble going there in high season, but it’s the only time we can actually do that. We managed to travel in China during Golden Week.

Schedule itself:
18 Dec – Flight from EU to NRT
19 Dec – 6 days in Tokio and travel to Nagasaki by Rail using Rail Pass (avoiding Nozomi and having Christmas Eve onboard)
25 Dec – 2 days in Nagasaki and travel to Hiroshima
27 Dec – 2 days in Hiroshima and travel to Kyoto
29 Dec - 4 days in Kyoto and travel to Osaka/Nara
2 Jan – 2 days shared between Osaka (no parties) and Nara – still not sure clear about the details
4 Jan – 2 days shared between Nagoya and Kanazawa - still not sure clear about the details
6 Jan (late evening) – arrival at Narita Hotel for last overnight
7 Jan – Departure to EU

So, what do you think?

I have few questions, if you don’t mind
- We’ll be traveling with 30kg / 66kg bags – do you happen to know reliable and how costly is the courier service?
- As you can see we’ll be traveling (on purpose) during holiday season – how would you suggest to lower the risk of not getting reservations for trains between 29.12 – 5.01? All tips are welcome. (I’m personally surprised that there’s no online reservation system. Even in 2.5 world like my country – Poland – this works pretty well)
- Are there any night trains with sleeping cars from Tokio to Nagasaki? We could gain one night by switching from Shinkansen to night train (we did so in China)

All above is still draft, so changes are more than possible – thanks a bunch in advance for your feedback – hope to start booking late this week.
Best
mf

sioFont

Hi.
I'm not an expert, but these are my comments. It's a nice itinerary, in my opinion.

Maybe you can save some time by taking a Japan air pass (both ANA and JAL offer it). Flight Tokyo-Nagasaki and, if you could skip Nagoya, go from Osaka to Kanazawa (faster connection) and flight Kanazawa-Tokyo.

As for overnight trains, there is a list here. You can take an overnight train to Okayama.

Maybe you can consider take a overnight ferries from Tokyo, but maybe not to Nagasaki. But distance is so big that you will spend more than a night, in case there is a ferry connection. I think Japanguide.net website has more information on ferries.

If you have a defined rail timetable, from the moment you have your rail pass exchanged, you can do seat reservations for all your itinerary. But maybe doing that on the 24th is too late (assuming you don't use the rail pass while in Tokyo)

There is a lot of references about Takkyubin (Japanese courier services) in this forum. Here there is information about rates from Yamato, one of the biggest Takkyubin services. It is reliable, in my opinion.

Good luck!

ksandness

If you are a first-time tourist, Nara and Kanazawa are more interesting than Osaka and Nagoya.

jib71

Agreed. I get the feeling that the itin. is based on place names that are well known outside Japan. With this relatively long trip it's possible to explore some places that are off the beaten track rather than just selecting the cities whose names are internationally known.

I recommend that the OP get a guidebook and consider including some regions that have great scenery and cultural attractions, but don't have the greatest name recognition outside Japan.

abmj-jr

I agree with the suggestion to obtain a good guidebook to Japan and do a little more research.

Aside from that, a few thoughts:

Switch Hiroshima and Nagasaki in your itinerary. Nagasaki is a LONG way from Tokyo by train. I suggest breaking that trip up by stopping at Hiroshima first, then the trip from Hiroshima onward to Nagasaki will be much more manageable. After that, the trip back from Nagasaki to Kyoto will be long but not unbearable.

Once in Kyoto, I see no advantage to moving over to Osaka for 2 days. They are only 30 to 45 minutes apart by local train - less by shinkansen if you have a Rail Pass. Nara is 47 minutes from Kyoto on the JR Nara Line. We often recommend just staying in either Osaka or Kyoto and daytripping between the two and to Nara. Save hauling the luggage around again.

I also recommend just eliminating Nagoya (very boring city) and spending the full 2 days in Kanazawa (not boring.)

How early is your flight home from NRT? You could make it from Kanazawa all the way to NRT in about 5-1/2 to 6 hours. Or, if your flight is early, just go from Kanazawa to either Tokyo or Narita City for the last night before departure as you have planned.

The "takkyubin" luggage delivery services are very reliable. You can make the arrangements at the major airports or most hotels.

It looks like a 14-day JR Rail Pass would cover all your travel from Tokyo onward, starting the 24th or 25th. Travel from NRT into Tokyo and around Tokyo at the beginning of your visit would be outside the 14 day period and out-of-pocket. If that is the case, the Keisei line trains from NRT to Ueno (in Tokyo) are much cheaper than the Narita Express.

This sounds like a very nice trip. Hope for snow in Kanazawa. The famous Kenrokuen garden is really at its best in the snow.

SJUAMMF

Then you should stop at Tsuruga on the way to Kanazawa. This is where the Monju FBR is located and they had a sodium leak a year after criticality. Near by is the Mihama reactor that had several pipe leaks.

MegatopLover

For foreigners not especially into winter sports but keen to see some pretty winter scenery, what would you Japan-hands recommend? Sapporo? Nagano? Visit would be in mid-late December.

Could try to fly into some place like Sapporo, or could take a train out from another major city. Alternatively, would be willing to just take a train through pretty winter scenery connecting two destination cities. Could do an onsen, as long as it's foreigner-friendly.

SJUAMMF

Kanazawa, Noto Hanto, Wakura onsen area is worth a visit in the winter. It is a combination of large onsen ryokan, good seafood and a beautiful snow covered winter garden. The JR Thunderbird train goes there directly from Kyoto and Osaka.

MichalFKowalik

Hey,

First of all thanks for your notes – much appreciated – they allowed to tweak itinerary to make it just a bit more relaxed, avoid unnecessary stress and unnecessary places.

Here’s an amended one with the following corrections:
- Will skip Nagoya and will just visit Osaka for a one day trip (thx to abmj-jr, ksandness, sioFont)
- Kanazawa has been added – we’ll stay there for the two days (thx to all)
- Shifted Nagasaki with Hiroshima to cut that long route in two. (thx to abmj-jr)

So – current itinerary looks per below:
18 Dec – Flight from EU to NRT (arrival 11:25AM)
19 Dec – 5 days&nights in Tokio and travel to Hiroshima by Rail using Rail Pass (~1PM - ~6PM)
24 Dec – 3 days&nights in Hiroshima and travel to Nagasaki (~11AM – ~2.30PM)
27 Dec – 2 days&nights in Nagasaki and travel to Kyoto (~11.30AM - ~5PM)
29 Dec - 6 days&nights in Kyoto, day travels to Osaka/Nara, travel to Kanazawa (~11AM - ~1PM)
4 Jan – 2 days in Kanazawa – yes, this one looks pretty promising and scenic, trip to Narita on 6th Jan (~3PM – ~9PM)
7 Jan – Departure to EU (10:20AM)

Few of your comments:

That’s a good news – in China we were forced to buy tickets/reservations city by city, basically in the last moment – that was really stressy.

I love saving almost as much as traveling – that’s a really good one!

Thanks for that one – putting this on my agenda for a review.

And the last one: YES – PROMISE TO STUDY THE GUIDEBOOK ASAP, I’m just overparanoid about booking flights/lodging as early as possible.

Let me know if you still see anything worth re-planning – thanks so much for your comments so far.
Best
mf

Ps.
Great idea, thanks – my GF told me right away, that she’ll skin me alive if I would propose yet another stop because of that subject. Next time

Grounded again

Would you happened to have any recommendation for nice ryokan in these area?

I was just researching for ryokan and found a site ryokancollection.com, which seems pretty nice. Anyone with experience booking through them before and is the ryokans worth the pricing?

Mic, we are actually going to be in japan at the same time but we are doing just doing things in reverse

msb0b

If you worried about not being able to book tickets around the New Year, you should consider putting the Tokyo portion at the end of the trip. Personally, I think doing the trekking up front and then have some time to wind down at the end works better. You can also use the time to pick up gifts and souvenirs, especially on the first, when the stores sell fukubukuro.

Off topic, but I don't think Los Alamos is that interesting of a destination. I doubt the labs will admit you unless you are on official business, as they carry out classified research. Trinity Site, the ground zero of the first nuclear device test explosion, in White Sands Missile Range, would be a better destination, but it is open to public only two days out of the year. You will need to plan your trip for it.

If you are a serious atomic tourists, you should plan your Hiroshima stop on 08AUG. There is an annual ceremony on the anniversary of the bombing of Hiroshima at the Peace Memorial Park.

SJUAMMF

We stayed at a fairly large one called Kagaya at Wakura Onsen on Noto Hanto. They assigned an English speaking hostess and she took care of us from morning until night, taught us how to properly wear yukata. Not known to us at the time, it is a tradition to tip the hostess, at beginning of the stay, in an envelope.

jib71

Not a tradition that many people observe, it seems. I tried once and my envelope was politely but very frimly rebuffed.

SJUAMMF

Interesting, may be they don't expect a gaigin (my assumption) to do this or may be this custom is too old. I didn't do it and only informed by friends afterward.

jib71

Blurgh. Gaugin yerself. I'm more of a Perry.