Hello, I’m in the planning phase for my trip this summer (mid-July), flying into Fukuoka.
First few days would be spent coping with jet-lag, acclimatizing and some light work-from-~~home~~hotel. During this phase we would have time for half-day trips, either in the selected city, or somewhere within \~1h (one way) by public transport.
After a 4-5 days or so the plan is 5-6 full days in Kyushu, using part public transport and part rental car.
At the moment my selected base of operations is Kumamoto, as it is quite central, easily accessible from Fukuoka airport and has a few PoIs we’d want to see anyway.
The problem is, I’m not sure if there is enough to do for those 4-5 days. The city itself is 1-2 half-days at most (The castle compound with its gardens and museums, zoo/botanical garden, Suizenji Jojuen garden, some shrines and temples, etc.), plus I think Unzen via the ferry would also be doable in half a day.
All other PoIs in the vicinity are in or around Aso-Kuju NP. That would require a rental car, would probably take up more than a half-day, and we plan to stay there for a couple of nights anyway.
What other base of operations would you recommend? Or anything noteworthy around Kumamoto I might have missed? (We are interested mainly in the nature, hiking, history and local culture).
We currently have plans for Kumamoto (5 nights), Aso (2), Nagasaki (2) and Fukuoka (1). There are also a few PoIs around Miyazaki and Kagoshima, but that seemed too far away, so we didn’t plan for those.
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by habdl