Help for planning travel between Tokyo – Kyoto/Osaka via the Hokuriku arch

Hi there!

My partner and I are planning a 10 day trip to Japan and we have booked our air tickets to fly into Japan via Tokyo and fly out from Osaka. We were initially going to take the commonly travelled route via the Tokaido shinkansen but recently found out about the JR Hokuriku arch pass and are considering it instead.

We love to explore Japan countryside and would definitely be keen to spend less time in the cities and more time in nature so we were really quite interested by this alternate route.

We plan to spend around 4-5 days along this route and were hoping to get some advice and help from the community as to how to organise the itinerary and what are the things to look out for/take note of.

We have done some research and have shortlisted a few of our choices. Any help would be greatly appreciated!

1. Snow Monkey Park, Nagano
2. Tateyama Alpine route (We are travelling in early May 2023 so hoping to do this as the season is right!)
3. Kurobe Gorge railway
4. Shirakawago
5. Maruoka castle, Fukui
6. Takayama old city
7. Kenrokuen garden, Kanazawa

Our trouble is that all these sights seem all over the place and it’s really confusing trying to figure out a route to visit these sights while travelling from Tokyo to Kyoto along this Hokuriku arch (and where we will have to look for accomodations for the night) :<

Thank you so much in advance for any contributions!

1 comment
  1. > Snow Monkey Park, Nagano

    Usually short of monkeys in May.

    The most efficient route for doing of the rest of itinerary on the trip would be:

    * Day 0: get to Nagano or Matsumoto (possibly early enough to visit either Zenko-ji or Matsumoto castle).
    * Day 1: Tateyama Alpine Route – full day, spend night in Toyama
    * Day 2: Day trip to Kurobe Gorge – possibly in the evening get to Takayama
    * Day 3: Spend time in Takayama, possibly relaxing a bit – after two very long days
    * Day 4: Travel via Shirakawa-go to Kanazawa
    * Day 5: Spend a day in Kanazawa (Kenrokuen, Myoryuji, Higashi Chaya, Nagamachi)
    * Day 6: Stop at Maruoka Castle on your way to Kansai

    And honestly I would add another day for soaking at Unazuki Onsen, because otherwise Day 1 and Day 2 would probably make you question the whole idea.

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