Hi all! My partner and I will be visiting Japan for 10 days in a few weeks. It’ll be my second time, and her first time. Just wanted to post our itinerary to maybe get some advice from more experienced tourists!
**Tokyo (3 Nights)**
Day 1 (TUES):
\-Land in Narita 16:00, bus/train into Ueno.
\-Dinner, and then spend rest of evening walking around and visiting department stores to try and beat jet lag.
Day 2 (WED):
\-Ueno Park in the morning.
\-Tokyo National Museum, probably around 10ish.
\-Light shopping in Ueno (I’m interested in denim and there’s a few stores there, lmao).
\-Head to Skytree, tickets to viewing platform at 16:00.
\-Kirby Cafe reservations at 18:40.
\-Jazz bar or something, unsure. Maybe nothing.
Day 3 (THURS):
\-Meiji Jingu in the morning.
\-Walk through Yoyogi park into Harajuku, walk through and then towards Shibuya.
\-Betty Smith Ebisu workshop at 13:00.
\-Walk around Shibuya, shopping and dinner and such.
\-Sakurai Tea Experience at 20:00.
\-Back to hotel to sleep.
**Kyoto (5 Nights)**
Day 4 (FRI):
\-Check out of hotel by 10, mail luggage(?), head to Ginza.
\-Light shopping in Ginza.
\-Shinkansen to Kyoto 14:00ish, arrive 16:30ish.
\-Check into hotel, immediately leave to get to dinner at 18:00 (cutting it close I know).
\-Bars and clubbing for a while.
Day 5 (SAT):
\-Bus to Nara in the morning.
\-Not a whole lot of plans in Nara really, just going to walk around the city and explore gardens. Figured we’d just see where the day takes us. Suggestions welcome!
\-Bus back in the evening and sleep.
Day 6 (SUN):
\-Nishiki Market 9-9:30ish.
\-Kyoto Antique Market at Pulse Plaza noon, spend some time perusing.
\-Unknown. Maybe just walking around Fushimi Ward, but we are absolutely open and looking for suggestions for nearby things to see.
\-Fushimi Inari at night (trying to avoid the huge crowds, and we’re fine with it being dark).
Day 7 (MON):
\-Gion exploring/shopping.
\-Yasaka Shrine/Maruyama at some point.
\-Also a lighter schedule day, figured exploring Gion would probably be a full day thing. Also open to suggestions here.
Day 8 (TUES):
\-Taxi to Otagi Nenbutsiji as early as possible.
\-Hike down into Arashiyama area, stopping to visit shrines and shops and such.
**Tokyo Again (2 Nights)**
Day 9 (WED):
\-Check out of hotel, mail luggage(?).
\-Get on Shinkansen around noon, arrive back in Tokyo 14:30ish.
\-Check into hotel, get food.
\-KOFFEE MAMEYA Kakeru at 17:00 with some friends.
\-Dinner and probably just walking around. We like walking around a lot.
Day 10 (THURS):
\-Tsujiki at 7 to try and beat crowds best we can.
\-Head to Koenji for vintage shopping and cafes.
\-Head to teamLab Borderless at 18:00.
\-Dinner somewhere? It’ll be our last night so we want to maybe do something fun but unsure what.
Day 11 (FRI):
\-Check out of hotel, head back to Narita and go home!
**Some notes and questions:**
\-I know it probably would’ve been smarter to fly into one city and fly out of another, but I already made the mistake of buying the tickets and now we’re stuck with it. We’ve also booked our hotels already, so moving days around is a bit tricky.
\-I also know it would’ve been smarter to fly into Haneda, but see above.
\-Whats the luggage mailing situation like? It seems a lot more handy than trying to schlep it on the Shinkansen with us, but we’re unsure how long delivery usually takes. We’re mostly nervous about mailing it from Kyoto to Tokyo and if it’ll arrive before we fly out? Advice would be appreciated.
\-We tried to keep Kyoto pretty open/unscheduled with mostly just locations, because I heard that’s the best way to experience it, but I’m a bit worried I underplanned those days.
Any other advice/suggestions would be greatly appreciated! This is my first time planning a trip so I know I made some mistakes. Thank you!
by ratbutenby