Hello Everyone!
I was supposed to take my first trip to Japan in March of this year which got postponed. I am hoping that I will be able to travel in time to see some fall colors. One positive about the delay was more time to rack up some airline miles and additional hotel points to help increase the length of my trip (and fly for the first time in business class!).
I have reviewed my itinerary many many times myself, but would love some feedback in case I am missing anything and I still have plenty of time to adjust. I haven’t even booked my flights yet so pretty much anything at this point could be changed. I would love your suggestions on restaurants (looking for a good upscale sushi lunch), activities and outdoorsy type things. I tried to leave a decent amount of open space each day for simple wandering.
**Day 1-**
Land in Tokyo 4ishPM
Check into Hotel
Get Dinner somewhere (Maybe just 7/11)
Relax
**Day 2-**
Senso-Ji Area
Edo Tokyo Museum
**Day 3-**
Walk through Yoyogi Park
Meiji Shrine
Harajuku
Mipig Cafe
**Day 4-**
Explore Akihabara
Room for something else here beyond shopping and Arcades
**Day 5-**
Day trip to Nikko
Toshu-Go
Jiunji Hondo Temple
**Day 6- (I’m not sure if I need to stay the night, but don’t love the sound of 4hr travel in 1 day)**
Stay the night in Nikko
Nikko Tamozawa Imperial Village
Kegon Waterfall
**Day 7-**
Back to Tokyo
Ghibli Museum in the Am/Afternoon
Golden Gai, Kabykicho area
**Day 8-**
Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building
Teamlab Planets (If closed by then Boarderless)
Kirby Cafe
Pokemon Center Skytree location
(I dont know if sky tree is worth the expense since Tokyo Metro Gov Building is free)
**Day 9 -**
Travel to Hakone
Open Air Museum
Stay at Hakone Ginyu or Yama No Chaya
**Day 10-**
Hakone Loop
Travel to Kyoto
**Day 11-**
Fushimi Inari Shrine and Surrounding area
**Day 12-**
Steak Otsuka
Arashiyama and area
Kinkaku-ji??
**Day 13-**
Day trip to Nara
**Day 14-**
Kiyomizudera Temple and Surrounding
Gion Shopping
**Day 15-**
UJi Day Trip!
**Day 16-**
Osaka
Dontonburi
Not sure what else to do in Osaka for a day
**Day 17-**
Nikishi Market
Travel Back to Tokyo
Free night?
**Day 18-**
Disney Sea!
**Day 19-**
Shibuya shopping
Any additional shopping or Areas around Tokyo i’d like to re-visit
**Day 20-**
Fly home!
10 comments
Hello, I live in Japan and traveled within the country extensively. Just a quick note about overnight stay in Nikko – I highly recommend it. Since you are planning for fall colors – if you happen to be there in the earlier part of November, the area, in addition to the shrines, also offer wonderful and easy to moderate level hikes. If you stay overnight, you can do one day of cultural sightseeing and the other day, you can explore Okunikko (the inner region) for wonderful hikes, waterfalls and lakes. I don`t know what kind of train pass you will be on but I highly recommend that you check out Nikko Wide Area pass which is a great deal covering a roundtrip train from Tokyo and unlimited use of buses (great network) in Nikko area.
Nikko, if you want to see the fall, for sure I would suggest to take 2 days, doing it all in one way would be a bit rushed, and it seems that there can be traffic during fall color season, so try to do it during week days. You can also book a place that have a onsen, and why not a ryokan on the nicer side with a kaiseki meal included ? Well, you can also save it for Hakone only, but in any case I would not miss the onsen.
While most days seems relax and really light. Day 8 is a bit all over the place, Shinjuku, Odaiba and Skytree are not exactly in the same area. Try to do things in the same area on the same day. For example, Skytree is close to Senso-ji. And while the Edo-Tokyo museum seems close to Senso-ji, transit wise it is not the really easy, but it is the next station from Akihabara on the Chuo line.
It’s Dotonbori not Dotonburi. You should plan more than that in Osaka and the best ambiance for this area is when it get dark.
As someone else commented, the Tobu Nikko pass is a good value and for Hakone, you can get the Hakone Free Pass that cover all the transport to do the loop, you can get the Odawara version and pay the one way ticket to Hakono-Yumoto (using the Odakyu Romancecar is the fastest) . In any case, for your itinerary, you do not need a JR Pass (in case someone talk about it).
What an amazing itinerary….our trip got postponed because of Covid too. I might have to steal some ideas.
Great itinerary.
You might think about flying into Tokyo and out of Osaka. It may cost a little more, but saves the cost of the train trip back and saves the travel time.
Ship your luggage from Tokyo to Kyoto and take a small roller bag to Hakone. Makes it easier to fit the luggage in the coin lockers at the open sir museum or train station.
It is quite possible to visit Fushimi Inari and Nara on the same day. But in general, I find that with a list of sites to visit, one can decide each morning how one feels and what the weather looks like.
The aquarium in Osaka is worth a visit, as is the train museum in Kyoto is your interests trend that way.
Imho skytree is worth it, go there on a clear day and you can see mt fuji. I went there right before sunset for some amazing views.
First I saw mt fuji, then the sunset and lastly the city lights turning on which really puts the size of Tokyo into perspective.
Disney sea is the best
A little heads up for your Nikko stay. The restaurants close very early. I believe it was around 5PM.
When it gets dark, all the tourists go back home and there are no more customers left in town. So as good as all restaurants and shops close.
We were lucky to find a little (3 seats) bar/restaurant still open in the station area. It had some nice food, great service and a nice variety of whiskeys.
Nice itinerary – classic! For our jet-lag-avoiding first day (we landed around 8am in Tokyo) we did your Day 3 itinerary and it was perfect – wandering Yoyogi park, Meiji Jingu, Harajuku, low stress, highly recommended to ease you in 😀
Is there any reason you want to do Planets over Borderless? Borderless is a bigger, and many would argue, better experience than Planets.
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In Kyoto, Day 11 and Day 14 you could probably combine – Fushimi Inari is a couple of hours and is easily accessible from Hagashiyama (where Kiyomizu Dera is) – I’d recommend Fushimi Inari at evening/sunset for a beautiful experience and less crowds. The day you save you could use to walk the Philosophers path and see the temples along that route – highly recommended way to see some beautiful parts of Kyoto
I have been planning to visit Japan in Nov 2021 too. 12 days in Taiwan first and then fly to Japan and spend 20 days. I might pick some of the ideas from your itinerary 🙂 Thanks