I am planning a trip in August to Tohoku region of Japan that includes all the prefectures (Aomori, Akita, Iwate, Yamagata, Miyagi and Fukushima) , but I feel quite overwhelmed and would appreciate your help.
Below I will leave the places I am planning to check out in each prefecture.
I have a couple of questions:
1. How long would you spend in Tohoku? I was thinking three weeks, so I would have half a week per prefecture. Is this enough? Or maybe too much? How much time would you spend in each place?
2. Is there any place missing that is a must see?
3. Would it be a good idea to rent a car and do this as a road trip? If so should I do it for the whole trip or only for certain areas that are less accessible or have inconsistent public transportation?
4. Should I sleep in the main city in each prefecture and do day trips from there or should I sleep in each area we visit (specially if road tripping) ? Should I book it in advance or can I do it as I go in order to have more flexibility (stay one more day in a place I love or stay one less day if disappointed)?
5. Is it worth to visit in the Summer? I know that in the winter and Autumn the views are gorgeous due to the snow/autumn foliage, but I have heard that Summer is beautiful too with a variety of greens.
6. Is the weather better than in Tokyo or I am still gonna become a puddle in the ground? Do you have any tips on how to deal with the heat and humidity?
In **Aomori** I would visit the following places:
* Shimokita-hanto Quasi-National Park
* Hakkoda Ropeway
* Aomori city
* Tsuru no Maibashi Bridge
* Hirosaki
* Oirase Gorge
* Hachihone
In **Akita** I would visit the following places:
* Akita city
* Namahage Museum
* Shirakami Sanchi and Blue Pond
* Meet Akita Inu Dogs
* Nyuto Onsen and Lake Tazawa
* Kakunodate
* Dakigaeri Valley
* Yokote Kamakura Museum
* Oyasukyo Daifunto
In **Iwate** I would visit the following places:
* Tono
* Sanriku Coast
* Ryusendo Limestone Cave
* Morioka
* Hachimantai
* Kitakami
* Hiraizumi
* Geibikei Gorge
In **Yamagata** I would visit the following places:
* Ginzan Onsen
* Yamadera (Risshakuji Temple)
* Dewa Sanzan
* Tsuruoka
* Sakata
In **Miyagi** I would visit the following places:
* Kinkasan Island (Sacred Deer Island)
* Tashiro Island (Cat Island)
* Ishonomaki
* Naruko Gorge and Naruko Onsen
* Matsushima
* Sendai city
* Mount Zao and Okama Crater
* Zao Fox Village
In **Fukushima** I would visit the following places:
* Oze National Park
* Ouchijuku
* Aizu-Wakamatsu
* Kitakata
* Goshikinuma Five Colored Ponds and the Bandai Area
* Tsuchiyu Onsen
* Fukushima city
Sorry for the long post and thank you for bearing with it =)
2 comments
1. Dividing time between prefecture is a fallacy. You have to decide what you want to see and since it’s an August visit – you would have to decide, whether to participate in major summer festivals that are happening in early August in Akita, Aomori and Sendai. Three weeks is a reasonable length of the trip focused solely on Tohoku.
2. I would cross Zao Fox Village off the list – if you like animals, that is. Also visiting Kamo Aquarium instead of Tsuruoka would make much sense (the city is bland, the jellyfish in the aquarium are spectacular). While Tashirojima and Kinkasan Island seem interesting – they also knock significant amount of time of any possible itinerary.
3. If JR East’s passes are available to you, then possibly a mixture of pass usage and car rentals might be most sensible.
4. I would advise to have everything booked in advanced for places you will visit before 20 August – a combination of major summer festivals and Obon can make accommodation very scarce very quickly.
5. Simple answer is yes. The more complicated is that you can probably leave certain locations famous exclusively for seasonal activities off your list (eg. Kitakami or Kitakata).
6. That depends. Lower altitudes in Fukushima Prefecture or Sendai are going to be only slightly better than Kanto Plain. Higher elevations, Aomori, Iwate and coastal areas might feel fresher.
Is half a week enough/too much for a prefecture ?
It can be both depending on how deep you want to go. Just for fun, I’ve been searching for interesting places in many prefectures (so far I’ve done all Kanto), just trying to list at least 7 city/town/village by prefecture and list at least 3 things to do in each. Looking at your list, you would have to do like 2 place each day, unfortunately, there is a lot that I cannot see how you can do more than one in a day (that is even without factoring time to move between each place).
This bring us to the next question, how much time to spend in each place. In my last trips, I did one city a day for most places. I would not go faster than that, while some cities are totally worth two days (I know it is not in the same area, but Fukuoka and Nagasaki are absolutely at least 2 days for me).
As for car rental, for sure you have many places that are accessible by train without problem, but you also have some places that are not as easy to access. So if you want to purely do it by train/bus, you might have to reconsider some locations and likely reduce the number of places you visit. But renting a car for 3 weeks, especially as a solo traveler will not be cheap. So yes, a combination of both may make sense.
Should you sleep in a main city or change to each place…. I would say a mix of the two. Try to see what make sense or not, how will you link the different places. For example I can see Miyajima as a daytrip from Sendai as it’s not especially a stop on the way to anywhere else (ok, appart from the cat island, where I would not especially go anyway). You can also consider just stopping by a place on the way, for example if you are to take the train between Yamagata city and Sendai, you can take the train in the morning to reach Yamadera and once you are done take the train to Sendai to sleep there. I just avoid backtracking. For example I would not do Iraizumi as a daytrip from Sendai just to go to Morioka the next day.
Actually, do you have any experience of traveling and changing city often ? The biggest tip I can give is to pack as light as you can, you will have to carry your luggage/backpack a lot and you want it to be as light as possible and it should even have spare space for the souvenir you will for sure want to buy. I would personally have 3-4 change of cloth and do laundry quite frequently. Even if most of the time I could leave my backpack at the hotel or in a coinlocker while exploring, some days I did bring my backpack with me for the whole day.
I prefer to book everything in advance so I know that I have a place to stay and that I have more choice than if I book last minute, also if there is a festival, it can be hard to find a place last minute. But some people would rather have the flexibility…
There is many famous summer festival in Tohoku as well as firework, so that would be a valid reason to go. Even if it might be a bit less hot than Tokyo, do not expect it to not be hot. Yes, there is tips to be prepared, but it will not make it less hot. Like always carry something to drink, procari sweat or aquarius are good options if you sweat a lot, you could bring an insulated bottle and transfer your drink in it to keep it cool for longer. Bring a small towel or handkerchief to wipe the sweat, wear a hat, don’t forget to put sunscreen, take break when needed.
If you go in winter, there will be snow, so with the option of driving, how is your experience driving in the snow ? Of course if you go during a festival,
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Overall it is an interesting list of places, but I king of doubt that you can realistically see all that in 3 weeks. I would honestly put all these points on a map and try to link them all, check how long it take to move from one to the other. Try to figure out when you would move from one city to the other and see hot much time would have for each place, don’t forget to check opening hours of places you want to visit.
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If you have any more specific question, let me know.