EDIT: im scrapping the first half of this trip and ditching hokkaido so Ill make another post once I get some new ideas.
Hello guys! I’ve recently saved enough money to finally travel and explore Japan a little. I plan to go around June- maybe early July for 2 weeks and possibly a few days more. I plan on hopping around a bit so If someone can give me insight on if i am doing too much then please do so 🙂 I have at most rough ideas of how this will go so I am very open to any new ideas! I apologize in advance if this post is too long too, I’m still quite unsure of alot of things.
For reference, I’ve never been to Japan but have studied Japanese for the past few years and mostly aware of basic do’s and dont’s in terms of social rules. My Japanese isn’t too bad and I think I could get by using it if needed.
If recommending places/things to do, I mainly enjoy parks and nature (really wanna see a bamboo forest) but not really too interested in heavy shopping or places crowded with tons of people. Some places I want to see though will have large crowds and I hope some of you can guide me to the best times to visit 🙂 My main goal from this trip is to visit places with beautiful nature, visit some temples, eat good food, and do minimal shopping. I want a medium-slow paced trip, not too rushed. This is embarrassingly what I only have so far
Day 1: Arrive in Sapporo in the morning. Air bnb for the next few days. Very chill day, visit 7-11 (super excited for convenience stores), a rotary sushi if I can, and 1-2 parks.
Day 2: Day tour visiting some places in Hokkaido like Shirogane pond, Asahiyama zoo, and Farm Tomita.
Day 3: Chill day, maybe visit Hokkaido University Botanical Gardens, light shopping, etc
Day 4: Leave to go to Hitoyoshi in the morning (all the way in Kyushu). This is where Im most unsure. I was planning on taking a full train/bus ride down there (JR Pass), but now im thinking it might be too long, so Im leaning towards just flying to fukuoka from sapporo, and then bus to hitoyoshi from fukuoka. Arrive to hitoyoshi around night? Airbnb somewhere.
Day 5: Hitoyoshi is perhaps the city I want to visit the most due to one of my favorite anime’s being inspired by some beautiful landscapes. I’ve seen others take 2-3 days to visit the locations, so thats what I plan on doing. I will visit some of the landmarks this day.
Day 6: Visiting more landmarks
Day 7:Leave early morning to go to a ryokan for 1 night. Explore more of Hitoyoshi.
Day 8:Activate 7 day JR Pass and head to Osaka.
Arrive in late afternoon and chill.
Day 9: Visit places.
Day 10: Visit more places in Osaka and around
Day 11: Go to nagoya or kyoto or tokyo maybe, im not sure. But I will stay relatively around this city for the next few days up until I go home.
Day 12:
Day 13:
Day 14:
Day 15: (possibly)
Day 15/16: Head on home
10 comments
A train from Sapporo to Hitoyoshi would be extreme. Fly to Fukuoka.
Whether a JR pass is economical depends on your departure airport. Use hyperdia to price individual tickets.
When booking, make sure things are cancellable without fees or refundable. No one knows what the travel world is going to look like next year and it’s best not to take chances with your money.
If you do end up going, make sure you have some travel insurance just in case you happen to need hospitalization. I would sign up for the alerts for the embassy of your country in Japan – when I was in Japan in March, it was invaluable to be updated by the US alerts.
I’d either visit Tokyo for a few days on your way to Osaka or skip Tokyo entirely. There’s lots of day trip activities around Osaka. And if you want to see all of Kyoto’s highlights you can count on at least 3 days.
I’d recommend the following places to fill up your itinerary:
Nara
Kobe(try that delicious 100$ steak)
Himeji
Skip Nagoya it’s not really a fun place for tourism
Hey, first off congrats on making this possible. It’s not an easy accomplishment.
* I’m going to open by saying Hokkaido to Kyushu is *a lot* of travel. We’re talking 3+ hour flight to Kagoshima followed by 2 hour bus ride to Hitoyoshi, OR 2 1/2 hour flight from Sapporo to Fukuoka followed by 3 1/2 hours by train/bus to Hitoyoshi. It’s a 22 hour train ride, so you’re right to nix that plan.
* With that said, If you want to do it, **do it**. But I would recommend flying into Kagoshima, rent a car if you can, it’s a 51 minute drive, and it’ll be that much easier to explore around Hitoyoshi. If you can’t rent a car, take the bus.
* When you’re done exploring Hitoyoshi, take transport to Kagoshima or Fukuoka and fly to Osaka.
* Using Osaka works (even though it feels the most crowded outside of Tokyo IMO) as a home base because you can use your JR pass to train out to Kyoto, Nara, Mount Koya, Himeji. I also really love Minoh Park in northern Osaka as an escape from the big city.
I do recommend scrapping Hokkaido entirely if you can. You could do more in Kyushu to make the trip to Hitoyoshi worth it.
* Yakushima is a 2 hour ferry ride from Kagoshima, and is the inspiration for Princess Mononoke. Ancient, subtropical cedar forests!
* Kagoshima itself has Sakurajima, an active volcano, and Senganen Garden.
>Day 1: Arrive in Sapporo in the morning. Air bnb for the next few days. Very chill day, visit 7-11 (super excited for convenience stores), a rotary sushi if I can, and 1-2 parks.
>Day 2: Day tour visiting some places in Hokkaido like Shirogane pond, Asahiyama zoo, and Farm Tomita.
>Day 3: Chill day, maybe visit Hokkaido University Botanical Gardens, light shopping, etc
>Day 4: Leave to go to Hitoyoshi in the morning (all the way in Kyushu). This is where Im most unsure. I was planning on taking a full train/bus ride down there (JR Pass), but now im thinking it might be too long, so Im leaning towards just flying to fukuoka from sapporo, and then bus to hitoyoshi from fukuoka. Arrive to hitoyoshi around night? Airbnb somewhere.
>Day 5: Hitoyoshi is perhaps the city I want to visit the most due to one of my favorite anime’s being inspired by some beautiful landscapes. I’ve seen others take 2-3 days to visit the locations, so thats what I plan on doing. I will visit some of the landmarks this day.
This is nuts. Like, actually nuts. I don’t usually recommend Hokkaido at all on a first trip unless maybe you’ve got like a month or more to spend, and you’re barely even doing anything there. Literally the only positive of going all the way up to Hokkaido is that you’ll have a couple of days in relatively cool weather at the beginning of your trip…but you’re doing it at the expense of rushing everything and spending loads of extra time just riding around in transit doing basically nothing.
And then you’re rushing down all the way down to Kyushu to do one thing and nothing else.
>Day 8:Activate 7 day JR Pass and head to Osaka. Arrive in late afternoon and chill.
>Day 9: Visit places.
>Day 10: Visit more places in Osaka and around
>Day 11: Go to nagoya or kyoto or tokyo maybe, im not sure. But I will stay relatively around this city for the next few days up until I go home.
>Day 12:
>Day 13:
>Day 14:
>Day 15: (possibly)
There is easily enough to fill your entire trip. I usually recommend around 2 weeks just for the highlights of Kansai and Kanto. Also, stay relatively close to which city? Osaka and Kyoto aren’t close to Tokyo, and Nagoya, while closer, [isn’t much of a day trip](https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2016/10/08/national/media-national/nagoya-boring-city-japan/).
Also, I wouldn’t get a JR Pass for this trip at all. As you have it planned, flying would be the much better option, though your trip doesn’t make a whole lot of sense as it’s planned right now.
>I plan to go around June- maybe early July for 2 weeks and possibly a few days more.
So you’re going during the middle of rainy season. Admittedly the weather in Hokkaido will probably be pretty nice at this time, but Kyushu, Kansai, and Kanto will be hot and very humid (and again, I don’t really think Hokkaido is the best introduction to Japan–especially if you can’t give it more than a few days). If you have any choice in the matter I would go a month earlier, or alternatively, a few weeks later so you can be there for the massive festival season that is mid-late July.
>I want a medium-slow paced trip, not too rushed.
What you have now is extremely rushed. You could cut this down just to Kanto and Kansai and still feel rushed. If you were really insistent on going to Hitoyoshi, then I would cut it down to just a week in Kyushu and a week in Kansai or something.
I recommend taking the train! I went from Sapporo to Kyoto on my last trip. It took about 8 or 9 hours. The trains are super comfy and a great way to see the countryside. You could even go Sapporo to Tokyo and then take the overnight train from Tokyo to either Okayama or Izumo and then jump over to Fukuoka from there.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunrise_Izumo
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Any chance you can change the date? Because June is rainy season and is Satan’s sweaty armpit in terms of heat and humidity (August is Satan’s sweaty crotch, but at least there’s a lot of matsuris happening then).
That said – two weeks and first trip to Japan?Choose between Kanto and Kansai, then plan your trip around that area. If you’re feeling a bit adventurous (or if you can fly in via Fukuoka), add Kyushu (Fukuoka)/Shikoku/Chugoku to the two choices above. This is to maximize your time experiencing Japan and minimize time in transit, and will make your planning easier (relatively shorter list of places to consider, for one).
Are you sure you want to go in Summer 2021?
I can’t imagine how nightmarish that would be with Summer Olympics going on. Hot,Humid, and lot places being jam packed with Olympic tourists.
Though if you are fine with that I would recommend Hiroshima
I supposed to be going in August 2020 for 3 weeks as it seems japan will be open to international tourism by August 1st