My gf and I have been saving up and planning a trip to Japan for over a year. We wanted to go in April 2021 but for obvious reasons decided to postpone. Our new dates are from 14th-26th of November 2021.
Our planning:
* **14th:** Fly from Barcelona. Luckily we’ll leave around lunch time so we can sleep in the plane and arrive before noon.
* **15th to 20th:** Arrive in Tokyo. Spend from Monday to Saturday exploring Tokyo. We still need to plan each individual day but we will do a lot of urban exploration, eating good ramen and visiting most of the common touristy places. My gf is specially interested in art as she’s an artist, museums on Japanese history, and fun stationery items. I’ve read about a stationery museum so if anyone has feedback on it I’d highly appreciate it. For me I’m trying to pick just one or two Pokemon Centers so we don’t have to visit them all, I’m also interested in everything video game related and want to visit some cool arcades, and want to visit some temples and learn about Japanese tradition.
* **21st and 22nd:** That’s Sunday and Monday. Leave Tokyo early Sunday morning and head to Hakone, we’ll spend the night at a ryokan! Make good use of the onsen all Sunday and use Monday to explore the area. Monday night go back to Tokyo…
* **23rd to 25th:** Tokyo Disney Resort! I’m a huge Disney fan and I guess my gf is a huge fan of mine so she puts up with this (just kidding, she enjoys it too). I’ve scheduled it so we are at Disney on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday which are the less crowded days of the week.
* **26th:** Go to the airport and back home.
So as said in the title I just made a booking for our Tokyo accommodation this week, free cancellation just in case, for 6 nights right outside of Ueno Station for 629€ which I think is a pretty good price, around the same I’ve paid when going to other major European cities.
I know this is very early planning and a lot can change in a year but I wanted to share nonetheless!
5 comments
For Hakone, it depend what you plan for onsen. If you only want to use the onsen of the ryokan, you cannot get in before check-in, that is typically from around 3pm, and not after check out next day. Realistically, you would visit a part of Hakone, go to the ryokan at check in, then use then onsen and you can return after the meal, and next morning onsen again then check out.
Keep in mind that people do not usually soak in onsen for hours, that can actually be dangerous, you can get dizzy and dehydrated by staying in hot water for too long. Usually you would probably be in the water for 10 to 30 minutes.
So you’re travelling across the world to spend three days in an amusement park? Well, to each their own, I guess
Wow you are really planning early! I would definitely visit Akihabara for the arcades and anything anime related if that’s something you are interested in. Great choice on Tokyo Disneyland, it was one of the best in the Disney line up for sure. I assume you are going to visit both parks, but if I had to choose I would go to Tokyo Disney Sea for the unique experience and Fantasmic!
If you can, I’d go in the Fall. The weather is less chilly. The fall colors are better imo than Spring cherry blossoms. Much less tourists, therefore making most things also cheaper too! But if course any time of the year is a good time to be in japan ✊
> For me I’m trying to pick just one or two Pokemon Centers
Do the one in Ginza, pretty sure it’s the biggest one, it has a huge shop and you re in Ginza, which can be interesting on it’s own (if you want to shop for clothes).
> eating good ramen
While ramen is great and all (I would recommend waiting out the line for Ichiran once; ideally come early), there are lot of other meals lot of people don’t know about (they don’t really appear much in pop culture), such as okonomiyaki and takoyaki. And unless you watch anime, I kind of doubt you would know about Japanesse curry either. Definitely try those out too!