My fiance and I are taking a 8-day trip in late-December, we’ll be arriving evening of Christmas Eve (12/24), leaving the day after New Year’s (1/2)*. It will be her first time in Japan and my 3rd time. We’d like to visit Tokyo (3 days) and Kyoto (2.5 days), but wondering if anyone has suggestions on where else we should visit to really experience the beauty of Japan in the winter without rushing it too much. We’re open to other suggestions aside from Takayama.
EDIT: Leaving on 1/2 instead of 1/1, so we have a total of 8.5 days.
Here’s our itinerary:
**Day 0: Arrive in Tokyo (evening)**
—
**Day 1 (Christmas day): Tokyo**
* Asakusa
* Akihabara/Shinjuku
* Roppongi illuminations
—
**Day 2: Tokyo**
* Ginza
* Harajuku
* Shibuya/Shibuya sky
—
**Day 3: Tokyo >** ***Takayama (in question)***
* Ghibli museum
* Travel to Takayama (4 hours)
—
**Day 4:** ***Takayama (in question)***
* Kokubunji-dori Street
* Yoshijima Heritage House
* Hida no Sato Village
—
**Day 5:** ***Takayama***?
* ***Anything else to do here, or should I spend more time exploring nearby Takayama towns (Shirakawa-go, Kanazawa)***
—
**Day 6: Takayama > Kyoto**
* Travel to Kyoto (3.5 hours)
* Higashiyama/Kiyomizudera Temple
* ***Anything else to do here, or should I spend more time exploring nearby Takayama towns (Shirakawa-go)***
—
**Day 7 (NYE): Kyoto**
* Fushimi-Inari-Taisha Shrine
* Nishiki Market
* Gion
—
**Day 8: Kyoto**
* Arashiyama Bamboo forest
* Kinkaku-ji temple
* Travel back to Tokyo in the early afternoon (2.5 hours)
—
**Day 9: Tokyo**
* teamLab
* Leave for 7pm flight
—
**Questions:**
* Takayama/Shirakawa-go for 1.5-2 days? Open to other suggestions!
* Traveling 3-4 hours each way from Tokyo to Takayama to Kyoto feels like it’s a bit rushed, but the architecture and novelty of Takayama downtown looks beautiful in the winter. I’m fascinated by the snow-capped houses in Shirakawa-go as well.
* If it is worth going, wondering if we should take more time here.
* Hakone/Mt. Fuji?
* Easier to get to from Tokyo, spend more downtime
* Nagano?
* Snow monkey park looks interesting, but seems like it would take long to get to as well
**More details:**
* We don’t care too much about skiing/snowboarding and trudging in the snow, but love whatever unique sights are available only in the winter
* Since we’re traveling during the holidays, worried about places being closed or trains being too crowded
Thanks in advance!
3 comments
I think it’s more 5-6 hours from Tokyo to Takayama. I think you either need to put in more time to the area, or it would make more sense to go somewhere else. With only 8 days to play with it seems like a waste to spend so much time in transit. I personally wouldn’t recommend going to Takayama and Shirakawago without also spending time in Kanazawa – which has decent links to both Tokyo and Kyoto. But you’d have to cut something (Kyoto, I guess? No point going to Kyoto for just one day) to make this happen.
Hakone is definitely the easy option. Nikko is nice in Winter too as a trip from Tokyo (could also extend from there to Aizuwakamatsu for more nice-Winter-places, but it’s probably B-grade for an international tourist destination – I liked it tho). Personally I’d happily cut Kyoto for smaller cities on a trip that short, but I’m sure people would disagree.
I believe you would be able to see snow on the roofs of the gassho-zukuri style houses of Shirakawago when you are there, for you to check. These are often shown on the promo pics as such. As a day trip you would take a bus to kanazawa from Takayama exiting at the half way point to explore Shirakawago. Shirakawago has luggage lockers and an overflow facility at the bus station. Continuing on to Kanazawa to complete 2 hour total on bus + 2-3 hours exploring. At Kanazawa the JR Thunderbird train would get you to Kyoto in 2.15hrs.
You could do a one hour bus from Takayama and return if that works out better for you but I believe it would involve more travel overall.
Factor in sunset will be before 5pm at the end of December.
I love Takayama but agree with a different commenter that it’s about 5.5 hours from Tokyo – so pretty far when only there for 8 days all up.
It is a pretty trip though through the mountains. I’d spend at least 2 nights there in a nice Ryokan, but it definitely doesn’t need 3 nights, also.