Departure on fri, august 4th from Florence airport. Arrival at Tokyo Haneda on sat, august 5th at 9.50am.
Day 1 – sat, 5/08 – Tokyo: arrival, try to figure out how life is after 12 + hours of flight, check in at the hotel and try to find something to eat and some exploring of the city. Taito and Sumida (Asakusa, Senso-Ji temple, Ryogoku-Kokugikan, Sword Museum Sumida Park, Sukai Tsurii Tower). Maybe sunset at Tokyo Tower.
Day 2 – sun, 6/08 – Tokyo: Taito and Ueno, Yanaka in the morning, stop at a sushi restaurant I’ve seen in an italian youtuber’s video; Akihabara and Ginza in the afternoon.
Day 3 – mon, 7/08 – Tokyo: Shibuya and Shinjuku; shopping in Shibuya, Aoyama, Omotesando in the morning; Meiji temple, Shinjuku-Gyoen park, sightseeing from the Government Palace of Tokyo in the afternoon; night in Shinjuku, preferably karaoke.
Day 4 – tue, 8/08 – Tokyo: Chiyoda (Yasukuni Shrine, Imperial Gardens, Kanda, Akihabara) in the morning; Bunkyo (Koishikawa Koraku-En, temples & shrines) in the afternoon.
Day 5 – wed, 9/08 – day trip to Nikko, 1h44min from Tokyo, visit the city
Day 6 – thu, 10/08 – day trip to Kamakura, 55 min from Tokyo, visit the city and put feet into ocean
Day 7 – fri, 11/08 – leave to Nagoya by train, 1h37min from Tokyo, visit the city in the morning, and in the afternoon, optional visit to Ghibli park (53min from Nagoya). Spend the night in Nagoya.
Day 8 – sat, 12/08 leave for Kyoto (35min from Nagoya) hotel check-in, Kinkakuji, Ryoanji and zen garden in the morning; Arashiyama in the afternoon and bamboo forest.
Day 9 – sun, 13/08 – Kyoto: Daitokuji and temples, botanical garden in the morning; Kyoto Tower in the afternoon, with Toji in the evening.
Day 10 – mon, 14/08 – Kyoto: Ginkakuji and hike to Eikando temple in the morning; Chionin and Yasaka temple in the afternoon, evening in Gion.
Day 11 – tue, 15/08 – Kyoto: Nijo castle, Nishiki and Teramachi markets in the morning; afternoon in Fushimi Inari.
Day 12 – wed, 16/08 – Kyoto: visit Pontocho and we leave for Fujisan station (4h13min), we arrive here and we sleep in our hotel.
Day 13 – thu, 17/08 – Mount Fuji – we start the ascending path, Yoshida Trail, we stop on the top, sleeping in a hut, we see the dawn and we go back to sleep.
Day 14 – fri, 18/07 – Mount Fuji – we climb back down from Mount Fuji and we leave for Kanazawa (6h10min by train).
Day 15 – sat, 19/08 – Kanazawa: visit Ninjadera, Chaya, tea house and Omicho market; castle in the afternoon.
Day 16 – sun, 20/08 – Kanazawa: Oaya Shrine and leave for Hiroshima (4h9min by train).
Day 17 – mon, 21/08 – Hiroshima: visit the city and the memorial.
Day 18 – tue, 22/08 – Hiroshima: Miyajima.
Day 19 – wed, 23/08 – Kobe: we leave for Kobe, we arrive, we visit the city and we look for some tasty meat and we leave for Osaka (13min by train).
Day 20 – thu, 24/08 – Osaka: visit Minabi, the Castle, Sumiyoshi Taisha Shrine, Abeno Harukas.
Day 21 – fri, 25/08 – Osaka: Shinsekai, Grand Front for some last minute shopping; aquarium in the afternoon.
Day 22 – sat, 26/08 – Osaka: airport and go back home.
Let me know what do you guys think. We’d like to see as much as possible, but in a relaxed way. If it’s possible, we’d like to stay in a ryokan, at least one night: were could we do that?
Any advice welcome.
1 comment
>I’ve seen in an italian youtuber’s video
Okay, first, I’m not saying you’re doing this but you saying this has made me want to do a PSA: be *really* careful when doing things in Japan based off what you saw on social media. This is more a warning of TikTok and Instagram, but most “travel” things on social media wildly oversell or misrepresent what they’re doing/their experience because they want you to click on their videos. If you build your trip based off of social media posts, *you are very likely going to be disappointed*. Always do your own research and don’t just trust people that are trying to sell you something/get your clicks. I’m going to Japan in a few weeks and the algorithm knows this and is showing me tons of videos that I know, from experience of having been to the places before, that the videos are absolutely full of shit and misrepresentative. So. Be careful.
Again, this message isn’t really at you, OP. It was just something that was on my mind that I was reminded of.
Okay now my actual advice for you:
>Day 1
Florence, Italy? That’s an 8 hour time difference with Japan so you’re going to be pretty wiped. I would be careful the first day and try to rest as much as possible so you can try and get ahead of the jetlag.
Overall I’d say your trip looks reeeally busy, but doable. Only real weirdness I see is you’re going from Nagoya to Kyoto, and then backtracking through Nagoya to get to Mt. Fuji, and then backtracking either through Nagoya *again* or Tokyo to get to Kanazawa, and then backtracking *again* through Kyoto to go to Hiroshima. Kanazawa is definitely the odd one out and there’s not really an “easy” way to do it with the rest of your trip, but you’re definitely doubling back way too many times. Also, Osaka is *right* next to Kyoto so you could reasonably combine them but since you want to visit Hiroshima and need to fly out of Osaka it makes since to split them up.
So right now it’s like this:
Tokyo –> Nagoya –> Kyoto –> Passing through Nagoya again to get to Mt. Fuji –> Circling back through either Nagoya or Tokyo to get to Kanazawa –> circling back again and going through Kyoto again to get to Hiroshima –> coming back to Osaka
If it were me I’d do one of these:
Tokyo –> Kanazawa –> Nagoya –> Kyoto –> Hiroshima/Miyajima –> Kobe on the way back –> Osaka (skip Mt. Fuji)
OR
Tokyo –> Hakone and Mt. Fuji –> Nagoya –> Kyoto –> Hiroshima/Miyajima –> Kobe on the way back –> Osaka (skip Kanazawa, add Hakone)
Either way, there are ryokan almost everywhere. Kanazawa and Hakone are both kind of known for them. Miyajima has lovely ryokan. I’d suggest look at Booking.com, you can search by ryokan.