Feedback on Japan Itinerary

3 comments

1. Honestly, this appears to be a pretty good plan and shows you’ve done your research. The sites you want to visit each day are pretty are close to one another which helps reduce any unnecessary travel time. Ikebukuro + Ginza might be better off split up though. Ikebukuro on your Shinjuku day and Ginza to be paired with something in the area like Tsukiji fish market or Odaiba? You’ve also done well to not cram too much into each day. The Arashiyama area is very beautiful with lovely Ryokans that I would recommend staying a night in. You can wake up in the morning for a nice walk around the bamboo forest without too much crowds.

2. Shibuya sky tickets are insanely hard to get, you have to check as early as possible it you want a chance to go up during sunset, you need trigger finger reaction to get it. The other option is to get a 3pm slot then camp out till sunset almost an hour and half later, there is no time limit to stay up there but it gets insanely cold. If you don’t want to waste that much time, night views are more impressive imo but day let’s you see much further.

   Kyoto imperial Palace is not open on a Monday and Tuesday, they are only open on Wednesday. Nijo castle might be similar? Monday is kinda a rest day for a lot of places.

   For centra Kyoto, the walking distance from Kiyomizu-dera all the way to yasaka shrine is not as far as it seems. You can start at Kiyomizu-dera then go up to yasaka shrine or the other way round. I’m gonna recommend Chion-in temple, absolutely beautiful to visit, and very different from other shrines in the area.

   Also I think we counted about 27 kimono rental shops walking from Kiyomizu-dera to yasaka.

   But as an advise, 4 days of constant temple and shrine visits might be cause some serious temple fatigue, I recommend having a seperate alternate itenary if at some point visiting temples makes start feeling like a pilgram monk or your feet becomes incredibly tired from all the walking. You can easily walk up to 1 to 2 km in a temple due to how big some of them are. I recommend visiting the Kyoto rail musuem if you want to do a non temple item.

   Other than that, itenary is relatively doable in Kyoto, but do expect certain fall out of plan. Your biggest enemy is daylight as if sets around 4.45pm, and a lot of tourist places close by then, and evenings might not have anything to do. But I recommend visiting bath houses or sentos in the evening. The really help relax your body after a long day of walking. They seem intimating at first but you’ll be hooked once you feel how good it is.

3. Instead of front loading Tokyo, I would booked with maybe 3 nights on the front end and 5 on the back end. This allows you to save a lot of your shopping for your last leg so that you’re not lugging around bags and also calms down the end of your trip, which should let you relax and actually enjoy the time more, without worrying about where you must pack and travel to next.

   As for Tokyo, you’re hitting up all the basic tourist spots, but I would recommend spending time exploring some of the more interesting neighborhoods; Koenji, Nakameguro, Tomigaya, Kichijoji, Daikanyama, Jimbocho, etc.