2 Week Honeymoon in Japan

18 comments

1. To be blunt your itinerary is all over the place and requires way too much movement for first timers. Generally if I’m advising friends or family, I suggest they stay in Tokyo and Kyoto and split the time 60/40. This requires less movement, so you can explore these massive and incredible cities. I’ve been twice and have never considered half of your destinations.

   – Kyoto requires a minimum of 3 days to see the highlights (rushed). You can do Osaka in 1-2. I like to break Tokyo into 5 days/2 days at the beginning and end so we can relax, go shopping and get our fave meals one last time.

   – I strongly advise against theme parks like Disneyland and Universal in Japan. No better way to burn $100+pp and a whole day by standing in lines for a 60 second ride. Cut them all, but if you must, go to DisneySea on a weeknight pass (discounted) and spend 4-5 hours there.

   -Plan 2-3 attractions per day. Group them by area. Check to see if they are open and require advanced ticketing. Understand that the Japanese love queuing so you have to account for lines at popular eateries and attractions.

   I really don’t know if you are prepared at this point to enjoy yourself with how much you have planned but also note you want to “play or by ear .” I showed this itinerary to my wife and she shuddered lol

   Edit: I did a rough tally of your train rides and it’ll be about 17 hours spent on the train. Throw out the itinerary and start over imo.

2. Day 5 onwards is leaving me breathless. Might want to consider skipping Kyoto and Osaka altogether and give more days to Takayama/Shirakawago, Kanazawa. Please kindly bear in mind that most of the places you’re going to would normally close around 4-5pm, especially in the northern side area. You also need to remember to give yourselves time to eat, also the cafe and dessert shops in Japan are amazing and you may want time to shop as well and some of these places have buses so you need to adhere to the bus route/schedules to get to places, like in Kanazawa.

   Also, you’re traveling during peak periods and mostly in non major city area. I would advice against taking chances on finding accommodations and also in your itinerary to start to figure out how you will handle your luggage logistics.

3. Suibuya:
   When you’re in Shibuya, I highly recommend visiting the Shibuya Sky rooftop observatory.
   The view is absolutely stunning, especially from sunset until dusk and into the night when the city lights up.

   You need to book online a specific time slot in advance. Sunset times can be a bit tricky to secure, but if that’s the case, try booking for the evening.

   Before or after visiting Shibuya Sky, you can go to Shibuya Parco (a shopping complex) where they have Nintendo TOKYO, Pokémon Center Tokyo, and Capcon Store.

   Also, a few minutes’ walk from there, Miyashita Park is a fun place to visit. It’s a mall that has a public park on the rooftop.

   Shinjuku:
   While you’re in Shinjuku, make sure to visit the renowned Isetan department store, especially their delightful basement deli section. It’s the perfect spot to indulge in some delicious desserts.

   Although Kabukicho is known for being a red-light district, it’s actually a lively and entertaining place to explore at night. A few minutes’ walk from Shinjuku station or Isetan department store.
   Don’t miss out on the fun izakaya experience at Kabukicho Tower, where you can try regional food from all over Japan.

4. The plan is doable but rushed for a first timer.

   Do not believe the JR Pass will work after the recent price rises. There are regional prices that may be of value, one I have seen one that includes some of what you are doing plus the bus journeys. You can check here to see how it adds up.
   https://www.japan-guide.com/railpass/

   Sunset will be around 5.20pm so factor that in.

   You need to map your journeys from matsumoto to kamikochi to Takayama to see if you can fit everything in. The bus connection times will impact along with what you do, ie getting off to see the pond. Kamikochi closes for winter on the 11th November so it may not look like it does in the pictures but it will still be a great experience.

   There may be no snow when you visit the snow monkeys as that will come later. Once again do not expect to see the classic monkeys covered in snow like in the adverts.

   Takayama to Shirakawago to Kanazawa involves a bus 1+hrs, exploring time 2-3 hrs and another bus 1+hrs. You may not have enough tine in Kanazawa to do all your plan on that day.

   I would skip Osaka at this time. Kyoto will be very crowded and the transport is not as efficient as in say Tokyo.

5. As far as professional knives go, Kappabashi area in Tokyo is the place to go. This neighborhood is famous for all sorts of culinary and restaurant goods. There are literally shops all along both sides of the street for several blocks.

   [Here](https://maps.google.com?q=%E3%80%92111-0035%20Tokyo,%20Taito%20City,%20Nishiasakusa,%203%20Chome%E2%88%928%E2%88%924%20THOSHICHI%20BUILDING%20MUSASHI%20JAPAN%20%E5%90%88%E7%BE%BD%E6%A9%8B%E5%BA%97%20Knife%20%26%20Sake%20Shop&ftid=0x60188f2885fd04b1:0xbd691df9b3a654ab&hl=en-US&gl=us&coh=176814&entry=gps&lucs=,47065934) is an example of one in the area, but you can just walk up and down this main street and you’ll find many other shops

6. As someone who also did a 2 week honeymoon in Japan for their first visit, is currently here now for #2, and is a “pound the pavement” kind of traveler— this is way too much. I get the feeling— you don’t know when you will be back so you want to try to do everything. But unless your goal is just to tick boxes, I really suggest you cut down. Also, You need to plan that there will be times that something goes wrong or things will take longer than expected, especially travel time. Sure, Google Maps says it only takes X time, but that doesn’t account for you being in an unfamiliar location and having to figure out where you are going. Google maps can be glitchy. You are also going to need to rest. Also; it’s your honeymoon. You really want to be spending it constantly on trains and never getting to sleep in?

   I think you really need to pick one of these two: (1) Kyoto/Osaka OR (2) the Alps regions. I wanted to do exactly what you guys are doing for our honeymoon 5 years ago, and there is just no way to do both unless you are just trying to check boxes. FWIW, we picked Kyoto/Osaka and had a great time , tons to do, and we can take day trips to other areas to get out of the city. We’re still doing primarily the same route we did previously because we didn’t get to see all the stuff we wanted. Just do like we did, pick one, and then start planning your return on the plane back :).

7. So i just left nagano/yudanaka (third japan trip) and to be honest i found it very underwhelming. There also wasn’t much to do at night as you have heard because it closes early. Zenkoji temple itself is nice but it wasn’t very impressive. As a first timer i would devote more time into places like osaka and kyoto. You can also see monkeys up in Arashiyama, kyoto.

   Remember, any day where you are travelling from place to place, half a day is already gone. For example, the train from nagano to yudanaka runs at very limited times (like once an hour or so) so if you miss it, you’re basically adding even more travelling time. Also, as someone who knows soke broken japanese and and can read the kanji and have already been here few times… there were still some hiccups with navigating. Sometimes that can make you miss a train or two. That can make for a stressful honeymoon with an itinerary like yours.

8. I’m going to be honest with you get data get google maps pray you can navigate the train and streets without basic Japanese. Somehow be able to see many places cheaply in a small amount of time.

9. Not going to comment on the other parts, but I’ll just say that seems pretty ambitious on Nov 5th – I love Kamikochi and have been a more than 10 times, and if you guys are very fast walkers it might be possible, but it’s kind of a lot. Average walking time to Taisho pond is about 2 hours one way, and I HIGHLY recommend going aaaaallll the way down to the 東電取水口 (hopefully it shows up on google if you copy paste) because it is in my opinion the best views (and not very crowded as it’s a less known spot). So 2 hours one way to Taisho pond, then back to Kappa bridge. Then it’s another 1 hour one way to Myojin pond and back. So that’s about 6 hours of walking if you don’t stop for meals, or at the visitor center, etc. You might consider cutting one of the two places or else definitely not bet on doing much other than just getting to Takayama afterwards.

10. you say you want to visit rural japan but literally none of your itinerary is this lol (it looks the complete opposite).

    as for forgetting anything major? of course. theres literally no way you can experience japan in just 2 weeks. you cant even do all of tokyo alone in 2 weeks. stop FOMO’ing and just enjoy what you can!

11. I think you’re trying to bite off more than you can chew. When you go to a new destination and then leave the next day, it doesn’t give you much time to see much of anything. You’re spending your entire trip on the move. Honestly, with twelve days, if I were you I would pick two or three locations other than Tokyo, max, and focus on those. Best “first” trip to Japan is just Tokyo to Kyoto and back, if you like Shirakawa-go you can spend two nights in Takayama so you can see it as well.

12. It’s not impossible, but like others have said, you will be doing a lot of traveling every day. The main difficulty with that would be first time trying to navigate Japan’s train system, which is not entirely hard, but you will spend more time than you may think trying to figure out what train to get on, platform, etc. Also, depending on how much luggage you have, it will make traveling by train from city to city to be a bit more extra work.

    Your schedule doesn’t look that packed for each individual day’s activities, so in that sense, I would say it is more or less doable. The main thing is traveling between all of the cities every day for 7 days in a row.

    If you have traveled like that in the past, in the sense of only staying in cities for one day before going to the next, then I would say go for it. You’ll definitely be getting only a small taste of every thing doing it that quickly, but if that is your goal, then it can work out.

13. I’d suggest Hakone for 1 night and booking a high end ryokan if budget allows since this is your honeymoon. I was at Ten-Yu a week ago for a belated honeymoon and it was serene (commute there can be a drag though). Even the less pricey ryokans should be a unique and memorable experience.

14. Regardless of how all over the place your current schedule seems, I would suggest going to Shibuya on Halloween. Never had the chance to do it myself, but it’s a big party every year. No drinking allowed in the area anymore though unfortunately.

    Regarding culinary knives and the like, I would recommend the Kappabashi area North West of Asakusa. This area is pretty much dedicated to kitchenware and cooking tools.

15. I personally think you’re cramming too much travel in such a short time. You’re going to spend a lot of your honeymoon simply in transit.

    I’d strip it back to Tokyo>Kyoto/Osaka. Alternatively you could do Tokyo > Nagano > Kanazawa > Kyoto. The latter route also minimises transit time by sticking primarily to the Nagano Shinkansen line while still getting you away from the bigger cities.

    Despite all the travel, a 2 week JR pass is still not good value (and that’s before the price rise kicks in for 2024!). Even trying to cram all your travel into an itinerary that fits a 7 day JR pass will barely break even. You will be far better off just paying each fare individually.

16. My spouse and I did 2 weeks in Japan for our Honeymoon in January and it was magical! We loved Nagano! It snowed the day we arrived so everything was beautiful and white. We stayed at Kanbayashi ryokan and it was so beautiful. Great food, amazing onsen. It was the most relaxing part of our trip and a great way to break up the hustle and bustle of Tokyo.

    I do think you should cut some other stops and spend more time in Kyoto. We were there for 2.5 days and it wasn’t nearly enough.

17. Are you saying you are going to do Kanazawa and Shirakawa Go in one day?? Shirakawa Go is a full day trip alone from Kanazawa.

18. The Tokyo portion seems fine because you have only a few things listed for there. Keep in mind that Tokyo is a late and early city: the most common opening times for shops, museums, and other indoor things is 10 AM; 5 PM closing times are not uncommon for things like museums. Many gardens and the like are gated and have opening and closing times: the ones in our area now close at 4 PM generally.

    For knives, I’d head to the Kappabashi area in Tokyo (near Asakusa Station).

    I haven’t been to all of the places you have listed, but I don’t recognize any rural areas on your list: it seems to comprise only cities of various sizes.