Hi all,
me and my girlfriend will be for the first time in Japan in August for a tour around the country (\~17 days).
We’ll stay in Tokyo 3 days (+ 2 extra).
About Tokyo, we’re struggling about how to plan our itinerary, i’ll put down below a draft:
Day 1:
* landing in Narita at \~9:00 a.m.
* move to our hotel in Ginza
* maybe a lunch in Tsukiji
* a walk through Ginza
* Kabuki-za
* arrive at the Imperial Palace, walk in some garderns, see some historical point of attention
* Yasukuni shrine
* National Theatre (?)
* New Otani hotel garden
* Odaiba in the late afternoon (???)
* dinner in shinjuku or Ginza and go to bed and rest a bit
Day 2:
* in the early morning move to Arashi Beya and see a bit the Sumo training
* move to Asakusa (Senso-ji, Nakamise-Dori)
* move to Ueno (Ueno park, Tokyo National museum?)
* move to Yanaka Ginza
* return to the hotel to refresh…
* …or going directly to Shibuya where we’ve a reservation to access to the Shibuya sky in the time range 19:00-19:20. Have an a aperifit with view, relax a bit during the sunset. If we arrive in advance maybe we can visit the Meiji shrine.
* dinner maybe in some nice Kaiseki (I’d like to book some nice place for a romantic dinner)
Day 3:
* Shibuya, Roppoing and/or Shinjuku by day
* afternoon in Akihabara (arcades, shopping and so on)
Bonus:
Day 4:
booked a hiking to Mt.Fuji, maybe only late afternoon / dinner is free
Last day of the tour:
we have the hotel in Haneda, we’re thinking about sending the luggages directly there and explore for the last time Tokyo until night (we’ve our flight the next morning).
We’re feeling overwhelmed by the size of the city and the stuff to do and see…
Questions:
* Does it make sense go to Akihabara in a different day from Ueno and other places (see day2)
* One night i’d like to attend a eurobeat event at Maharaja in Roppongi, maybe day2 or day3?
* Best places/areas for a romantic couple dinner in Tokyo?
* Best places/areas for having fun after dinner (e.g. cocktail bar, live music or club)
* I don’t know in which day put a visit to Nakano Broadway
* Do you suggest somemust visit museums in Tokyo?
* Does the order of the visit make sense?
ps: i’m saving a lot of stuffs on gmaps that i left out the main itinerary (shops, museums, restaurants, place to visit)
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Many thanks!
2 comments
I believe you are overbooking your itinerary, you need to consider the time it takes to do all the things you are planning to do, for example your day 1 plan:
– 9.00ish: Landing at Narita. Your will be able to leave the airport 9.30-9.45 the earliest, but you might want to get a mobile sim, public transport card or a bite to eat as well. But lets say you will leave there soon.
– 11.00-11.30: Arrive around Ginza. The distance from Narita to the center of Tokyo is quite far. You will take about 90 minutes to get there, 2 hours if you take the cheapest train.
– 12.00 Is a realistic time to expect to arrive at your hotel. Checking in procedure etc. Walking to Tsukiji, you can expect to be able to eat some lunch around there at 12.30-13.00.
– 14.00 Finished lunch. Ready for sightseeing. Walking around Ginza strip, Tsukiji and see Kabukiza is a great idea for this day. They’re all in walking distance of one another. I guess you only want to see the Kabukiza building? If you want to attend Kabuki theatre it will take a lot more time.
– 15.30-16.00 Move to Imperial Palace Gardens. Only problem is that the gardens close at 16.30. Yasukuni closes at 18.00. If you want to combine the imperial palace, yaskuni and Ginza on this day trip, I suggest you switch the order and go straight to imperial palace after lunch, yasukuni after that, then travel back to Ginza and walk around there. Ginza shops will still open after 18.00 so this order makes more sense. The other activities you wrote down on this day are simply too much to include on day 1.
Day 2:
This day looks also very full. Asakusa will take at least 2 hours to explore, but then you don’t give yourself time to enjoy the little streets around Sensoji and all the traditional shops and eateries. Ueno park is very big and can take a few hours to see as well. This itinerary could probably work if you would take out eather Ueno or Yanaka, but as a general advice I usually tell people to stick to a maximum of 2 neighborhoods per day in Tokyo.
Day 3:
I would probably reserve this day for the Shibuya area. If you are anyway planning to visit here, keep Shibuya Sky for this day as well.
Akihabara is not the best place for shopping unless you’re going for some of the niche markets like anime figurines or electronics. Akihabara is an interesting place to visit but if you’re short on time and not a big anime fan it’s also skippable. I would then rather focus this day on visiting Shibuya in the morning (perhaps include meiji shrine in the morning if you’re interested) and visit another area in the late afternoon/evening. That can be Roppongi, but could also be the Odaiba area. Taking the Yurikamome monorail is still one of my favorite things to do in Tokyo. However be aware that a lot of attractions in the Odaiba area are currently closed! Still, taking a sunset walk in Shiokaze walk can be very romantic (I actually had my first date with my wife there!).
Last day:
You can use this day to visit places that didn’t fit into the earlier days. Yanaka is a very nice area for example. You could visit on this day. You could also dedicade this day to Shinjuku and visit the Shinkuju garden, metropolitan center (free viewdeck!) and do some last day shopping. Visiting a Tokyo Department Store is also a great experience. There are several in Shinjuku.
So, to summarize:
Day 1: Arrive in Ginza, Lunch in Tsukiji, move to Imperial Palace, Yasukuni Shrine, move back to Ginza, spend the night exploring Ginza, Tsukiji.
Day 2: Sumo practice, move to Asakusa, visit Sensoji and explore the town, after lunch move to Ueno. Visit the park, explore Ueno town (maybe Ameyoko?). Nighttime plan can be Shibuya Sky, but you can also keep this for the next day or replace with something else. This might be a good day to visit Roppongi at night.
Day 3: First half of the day in Shibuya. Start at Meiji shrine (optional) and then on to Shibuya town. There is so much to see here. Shibuya Sky has a good reputation, Miyashita Park is interesting too. Then there are all the shops ofcourse. In the evening you could move towards Odaiba. Take the Yamanote line to Shinbashi and here switch to the monorail. Enjoy the sunset, get off at Daiba station and walk around Shiokaze park. See the Gundam statue as well.
Day 4: Mt. Fuji day trip.
Day 5: Can be dedicated to Shinjuku, last minute shopping, garden, metropolitan building. Nakano is only 2 stops away from Shinjuku so Nakano broadway can be added here. Alternatively you could visit Yanaka Ginza and Akihabara on this day.
Hope this helps a bit. The feeling of being overwhelmed planning Tokyo is not in your head. 4 full days is simply not enough to see it all, so you have to make choices on what you want to see and do the most. Good luck planning!
Few comments
Day 1. What day is this ? Alot of shops in Tsukiji are closed on Wednesday, so keep that in mind.
Day 1 is very packed. You likely wont get to Tsukiji by noon to 1PM after check in.
Ginza easily took me half a day with alot of interesting POI here such as Uniqlo, Muji, Seiko Museum, etc.
Day 3.
There is no chance you can have Kaiseki meal after Shibuya. Shibuya 19-1920 entry time meaning your sofa time ends is probably closer to 9. Check when your actual sofa is. Our sofa was from 7-750 (entry 1830) and we were dome closer to 830pm. There was a huge line going down elevator. Kaiseki meal takes 2 hours to complete, I am not sure which restaurant starts Kaiseki at 9pm+