I just scored award tix to Myanmar with a 6 day stopover in Japan for November 2014. We will fly through NRT. I plan to buy railpasses for hubby and I, base ourselves in Kyoto and do day trips from there in the Kansai area. Exact dates we'll be in Kyoto are Nov. 13 to Nov. 18. so I need 5 hotel nights.

is there something going on in Kyoto at that time? I'm finding many hotels are already all booked up and have no availability. Or do the booking sites like Agoda not go out that far? Even some of the hotel web sites do not have availability calendars for Nov. 2014.

What is the customary time to book hotels in Japan? 3 months out, 6 months out? I want to stay close to the train station and try to find a hotel in the $100 price range that includes breakfast. A ryokan would be okay too. I speak some Japanese so a place that caters to mainly Japanese would work for us.