As I'm sure you may well know by now, my wife and I are celebrating our honeymoon this fall by spending 5 full weeks crossing Honshu. We're ending our trip in Nagasaki, where we'll spend 3 nights, then one final night in Tokyo before flying home.

We are staying in the Matsu no Ma room at Sakamotoya ryokan and I'm a bit concerned that we may be completely burned out on ryokan by the time we reach Nagasaki.

It will have been 4.5 weeks of non-stop travel, and while I'm looking forward to experiencing what looks like a wonderful historic inn and I'm hopeful about our stay, I'm also realistic that the lack of privacy and personal space and weeks spent sleeping on tatami mats might well catch up with us at this point.

I'm trying to plan a back-up if this happens, and have been looking at other options in Nagasaki. There are two hotels which I've been considering, neither of which appear to be centrally located and both seem to be a bit out of the way.

The first is Garden Terrace Nagasaki Hotel, which looks interesting architecturally, but the interior looks a bit like an Ikea store display and I'm uncertain about it's location and accessibility/walkability.

I have purposefully not really planned this portion of our trip as I'd like to just wander around and get lost; happen upon interesting sights, discover great places to eat, etc.

The obvious "highlights" have been noted - the Nagasaki Atomic Bomb Museum and Peace Park & Memorial Hall, Clover Garden and Former Glover Residence, Dejima Wharf, Shinchi Chinatown, Suwa-jinja Shrine, Nagasaki Prefectural Art Museum, Kazagashira Park and the Cable Car to Inasa-Yama Lookout.

I suppose that all of these things could well take up the majority of our time in the city, but I wonder how inconvenienced we'd be if we switched over to the Garden Terrace.

Similarly, I'd love to take advantage of the ocean for at least a day or afternoon while in Nagasaki. I just discovered the Nomozaki: http://en.miyabidai.com/article.php/kenkomura_en

I'm having a bit of difficulty navigating the website and finding decent photos online. I'm uncertain if this is a resort style hotel (is it on a golf course?) and whether it's on a beach or has beach access. From a blog post that I came across, I get the sense that it is on a beach, which would be really nice.

A couple of questions about beaches and swimming in Nagasaki... first, will it be "beach weather" come the last week of November and first few days of December or is it beach weather year-round? Second, can you actually swim in the ocean in this area - is it safe, clean (not affected by Fukushima) and reasonable temperature?

Would we have sufficient time to spend a day at the beach given that we only have 3 nights in Nagasaki and want to see all the highlights plus wander around? Would that be a waste of time considering we live in California? We'll be inland and up in the mountains for most of the trip, so I thought it might be interesting to spend an afternoon on a beach in Nagasaki.

Also, is anyone familiar with the Sakamotoya ryokan that we presently have booked? If so, what are your thoughts? Is it worth staying put for the three nights since it's centrally located and the other two hotels seem to be out of the way? How inconvenient would it be to stay one or two of our nights at the Nomozaki and what's the atmosphere - is it a weekend beach resort, lots of families and young children, etc?

I came across a random blog that got me curious about the beaches and seasides of Nagasaki, here: http://marynewton.typepad.com/weblog...on-plan-b.html

In the above link, they visit several waterfalls but don't mention which ones or where they're located specifically. It looks very pretty and I wonder if any of you know where these might be and same questions apply with regards to our schedule and time constraints, accessibility, convenience, etc.

Here's one more blog entry that was posted right before the above, where they visit another waterfall in what looks like a very secluded area, with natural rock pools that you can swim in: http://marynewton.typepad.com/weblog...ki_ken_ro.html

I'd love to know where this is as well. Is this something we'd be able to fit into such a short stay? Should we plan to spend anytime at all by the beach or waterfront while in Nagasaki?

It's the one city in our travels that I've really done little research on and know nothing about beyond it's historic signifigance (WWII and bomb) and that it's a big bustling metropolitan.

I'd greatly appreciate any thoughts, advice or feedback... and if anyone knows about any of the above mentioned hotels or ryokan, I would also really love to hear from you!

PS - We'd be travelling via the Shinkansen Sakura from Hiroshima (we're staying at Iwaso on Miyajima the night before) probably around mid-day or mid-morning at earliest, spending whatever's left of the afternoon and evening... plus the following full day and evening... plus one more full day and evening... and then we leave for Tokyo from NRT at 2pm on our last day, so we'll probably leave for the airport at around noon.

Nagasaki is a nice city to visit...� but not really a beach destination in November/December. And for your question about swimming, have you looked at a map of Japan lately and seen where Fukushima and Nagasaki are located?

The OP obviously wants eveything to go super smooth for the entire trip and I applaud him for that. As for that question, it did make me laugh.

Swiimming? With an average high of 14C and a low of 7C at that time of year? Not exactly.

Thanks, that takes care of the beach question then!

I didn't realize Fukushima was so high up the coast. It was just a thought.

It sounds like the fall weather around Coastal Japan is much like the winter climate around San Francisco. I'm crossing my fingers that temps hang around the 60� region while we're there. I guess that Nomozaki Hotel must be seasonal.

Yeah, forget about swimming/beaches. Having said that, Nov/Dec is a great time to visit Nagasaki.

The location of the Garden Terrace Hotel is not very convenient. So it won't work if you want to be in the middle of everything, or if you're someone who wants to be able to come back to the hotel once or twice during the day for breaks in between sightseeing. But it's apparently a nice hotel with a very nice view of Nagasaki. So it sounds like there're good enough reasons to consider this place, and maybe staying here will substitute for going to Inasa mountain at night.

I don't think you need more than a day to take in the main part of Nagasaki. That's not to say one would get bored spending 3 days or even a week in Nagasaki. To me, Nagasaki exudes certain ambiance different than anywhere else in Japan, and that alone is reason to spend a few days there. But you can take the trolley to Glover Garden, stop by Oura Cathedral, stroll back along the hills through the Dutch Slope, see Chinatown, hang out in the Kanko-dori area and the nearby shotengai arcade, check out the Megane-bashi bridge... you can easily do all that in less than a full day. Nagasaki's Chinatown is tiny and not nearly as vibrant as Yokohama or even Kobe's. Another 1/2-day could be spent over in the Peace Park area. If you really wanted to, you could do all of the above (including the Atomic Bomb area) in one day, but that might make for a long day.

If you have 2.5 days in Nagasaki, you could consider spending 1.5 days in Nagasaki doing the above, and then using another day for a day trip nearby. There are many great day trips out of Nagasaki. Day trip options include Shimabara/Unzen, Sasebo with cruise to Kujukushima, Biopark, and Haus Ten Bos.

Thanks so much; I've been doing a bit of research on your suggestions and Sesebo sounds like a perfect day trip!

I'm a bit confused by Sakai though... it's a National Park that used to be a major base of the Imperial Japanese Navy, but the photos on TripAdvisor show a bunch of touristy pirate ship cruises, an aquarium, and lot of random city shots that don't look very much like a Nat'l Park. What exactly is present-day Sakai and is it worth visiting?

The cruise to Kujukushima looks like a lot of fun and we'll surely add this to our itinerary. Are all the small surrounding islands nature preserves and can you actually dock and set foot on any of them or are they protected lands?

I see that there's a "Kujukushima Zoological and Botanical Garden" which I assume is not actually on Kujukushima island but located on Sasebo, right? I've read that it opened in 1962, so it seems to be a staple of Sasebo. Is it worth a visit? What about Umikara Aquarium? Are either of these particularly well done or interesting?

Lastly, Huis ten Bosch sounds pretty quirky but apart from the replica architecture of old Dutch buildings and canals, what is actually comprised of this theme park? Are there activities and rides or is it mostly commercial shops? I've read that there's some poorly researched historical presentations about the Netherlands so I get the sense that this is more like a Vegas style commercial center than an actual museum. Would I be right about that?

What's the Biopark btw; I haven't been able to find that online - is it the zoological and botanical garden?

Thanks again for the great suggestions!


PS - Are you familiar at all with Sakamotoya ryokan at 2-13 Kanaya-machi? I get the sense that it's pretty centrally located and very walkable; is this correct?

The Kujukushima cruise that I took didn't stop off on any of the islands. The scenery is very nice, but I suppose it's best done on a sunny day. It takes off from the Pearl Sea Resort, which has shops, restaurants, an aquarium that I thought was worthwhile with a nice dolphin show. There's an area where you can pluck a pearl out of the oyster shell yourself, but I did not try that. I believe you can also do things like kayaking.

Huis ten Bosch (I had the spelling wrong), to me, is pretty amazing. It's a replica of a Dutch town. It seems like people either love or hate this place. I personally love it, and I think it's really nicely done. Even though some people think it's phony, this type of theme park is only-in-Jpn type of experience. I'm not sure that you'll be impressed with their museums or rides/attractions. But it just has a very nice ambiance with windmill, gardens, canals. They have boat rides around the complex, and you can rent a bike to roam around on (which I'd recommend). There's laser / light projection mapping show at night, which was impressive.

Biopark is at: http://www.biopark.co.jp/en
Lots of hands-on opportunities with the animals.

I think you'll have to research these places and decide for yourself which is your type of place. Personally, I'd choose HTB, but it may not be a safe recommendation since I'm afraid some Western visitors might be put off by that type of attraction in Jpn. The Shimabara/Unzen option may be a good one to consider, and one that perhaps most everyone can agree is very nice for all visitors to Nagasaki. Hopefully, other folks will chime in with their 2-cents.