After planning my trip and going through various route planners, I have calculated that we’ll be spending about 20 hours on trains/planes traveling between cities (I didn’t include local travel within the cities my wife and I are staying in). I was wondering if this is excessive and I should consider pruning parts of my trip? Also, I currently don’t have each day planned out, but more of a “these are the things I’d like to see and do at some point in this city,” is that a good idea? I used the JR Pass calculator and it says that I’m about breaking even despite all the travel. I have been hearing a lot of negative things with the updated price hike but I was wondering if anyone has gone recently and didn’t regret getting it?
Our main interests are food/coffee and I know there are too many locations listed for me to try, but we will probably eat/drink based on where we are. I also plan to stop at Mugiwara stores in each major city and am looking to pick up a few Japanese chef knives. Also, how is the pickup basketball scene in Japan? I was thinking I might need to scratch the itch to shoot some hoops at some point.
**3/21-3/24: Tokyo**
* Haneda>Ueno
* Homebase in Ueno and plan to keep things light during this leg of the trip
* **POI**: Ueno park, Akihabara, Yoyogi Park, Mieji Jingu, Meguro River, Senzokuike Park, see the Gundam before they close it
* **Food**: Hasegawa, Akiyoshi, Tonkatsu Suzuki, Chūka Soba Ginza Hachigo, Ginza Kagari, PST Higashi Azabu
* **Coffee/cafes**: Coffee Wrights Kuramae, Kielo Coffee, Glitch Coffee, Fuglen Asakusa, Unlimited Coffee Bar, Coffee Elementary school
**3/24-3/27: Kyoto**
* Ueno > Nagoya (lunch and explore for a couple hours) > Kyoto
* Homebase in Nakagyo Ward in Kyoto
* **POI**: Kiyomizu-dera, Higashiyama, Okazaki Park, Kiyomizu-dera, Arashiyama, Kyoto Tower, Kiyomizu-dera, Higashiyama Jisho-ji, Fushimi Inari
* **Food**: Gion Sushi Tadayasu, Kobe Beef Steak Mouriya Gion, Ramen Sen-no-Kaze, Kichi Kichi Omurice, Pizzeria Napoletana Da Yuki, Kyoboshi
* **Coffee**: Weekenders Coffee, here Coffe, Coffee Base BnA, Yugen, Kurasu
* **Extra**: Debating on day trip to either Uji or Echizen. I love matcha and I also want to bring home 2-3 Japanese chef knives. I want to do both, and I was planning on spending a portion of my Osaka stay going to the Sakai ward for knife shopping, but I’ve read multiple reports of Echizen being a great experience.
**3/27-3/28: Matsue**
* Kyoto>Yasugi – planning to make a pitstop for lunch and to see either Himeji Castle or Korakuen
* Homebase in Saginoyusuo Ryokan
* **POI**: Adachi Museum
* **Food**: Kaiseki at the Ryokan
* **Coffee**: サルビア珈琲
**3/28-3/30: Hiroshima**
* Yasugi>Kurashiki>Hiroshima
* Homebase in Naka Ward
* **POI**: Peace Memorial Park, Shukkeien, Hiroshima Castle, Itsukushima, Kintai-kyo Bridge
* **Food**: Ichiran, Hanaichimonme Honten, Onomichi, Yoshi Sushi, Kyo Sushi, Ekohiiki
* **Coffee**: Obscura, Bagtown Coffee, Side Stand Coffee, Progress
**3/30-4/1: Oita**
* Hiroshima > Yufuin
* Staying at 2 different Ryokans each of the nights
* **POI**: Comico Art Museum, Donguri No Mori
* **Food**: Kaiseki meals at Ryokans, Mabushi “Shin” Yufuin Ekimae, Yufuin Kinsho Croquettes
* **Coffee**: Ordinary Day Coffee, Cafe Anahata, Cafe La Ruche, Café TABIMUSUBI
* **Extras**: Wife has tattoos so we’re staying at Ryokans with private onsens and foregoing the onsen tours
**4/1-4/3: Osaka**
* Yufuin>Osaka – originally we were going to take the JR lines but I am still debating about JR pass. I’d save a lot of time flying OIT>ITM
* Homebase near Dotonbori
* **POI**: Sorakuen Garden, Expo Commemorative Park, Tsurumi Ryokuchi Park, Mint Museum, Tennoji Park, Osaka Aquarium, Sumiyoshi Taisha, Sakai Ward, Nara Ward
* **Food**: Botani:Curry, Kurogin Tuna Store, Jouroku, Kadoya Shokudo, Kobe Beef Steak Ishida, Ramen Hayato, Shabutei Shinsaibashi, Tajimaya Shinsaibashi, Okonomiyaki Chitose
* **Coffee**: Mill Pour Coffee, LiLo Coffee Roasters, Brooklyn Roasting Company, All Day Coffee
* **Extras**: Half day trip to Sakai ward for chef knives and meet some blacksmiths, day trip to Nara, half day trip to Kobe worth it?
**4/3-4/4: Hakone**
* Osaka>Hakone
* Ryokan Stay
* **POI**: Open Air Museum, Ropeway
* **Food**: Ryokan Kaiseki
* **Coffee**: Café Ryusenkei
**4/4-4/8: Tokyo**
* Hakone > Tokyo
* Homebase in Shibuya
* **POI**: Nakano Broadway, Kichijōji, Ghibli Museum, Edo-Tokyo Open Air Architectural Museum, Shinjuku Gyoen National Garden, Harajuku, Skytree
* **Food**: Chocolate Bank, Tonkatsu Maisen Aoyama, Musashiya, Ebisu Endou, Shibuya Tokyu Food Show, Afuri Nakameguro, Satsumakko, Mark’s Tokyo, Butagumi, Soba House Konjiki-Hototogisu
* **Coffee**: Chop Coffee Omotesando, Chatei Hatou, Higuma Doughnuts × Coffee Wrights, Cafe Reissue, White Glass Coffee, Onibus Coffee, Ogawa Coffee Laboratory Shimokitazawa, Fuglen Tokyo, Little Nap Coffee Stand
* **Extras**: This leg of the trip will mainly be where we do our shopping and just seeing where each day takes us.
4 comments
The travel time is a result of you doing a back and forth. The JR pass has value when you’re retracing your steps, but when you consider a more efficient path you tend to reduce the overall cost to the point where the JR pass doesn’t grant much benefit.
I have for example a similar length itinerary (21 days) where we are going from Tokyo>Fuji>Osaka>Hiroshima>Fukuoka and our major train/Bus transit times are about 12 hours total. It’s because we arrive in Tokyo and leave from Fukuoka, and so not backtracking saves a lot of transit.
If I could give you advice on that it might be seeing if you can figure out a path that is far more one-direction, and doesn’t return to Tokyo. Plane ticket costs might not allow this to make sense, but ultimately I am of the school of thought that on vacation, time is more valuable than money, and chopping out 5-10 hours on trains is definitely worth a small increase in the cost of plane tickets.
Yes, it’s perfectly sensible to not plan your days out in detail in advance. The weather in Japan is very changeable, so I suspect that the people who do this end up having to junk their plans fairly often.
Note that the popular coffee shops in Japan often have long queues to get in. It’s up to you if you think this is worthwhile, but visiting so many of them would chew up a lot of your trip.
The pass calculator looks like it pays off because of inefficient routing and does not take into account various foreigner benefits.
For example, Matsue-Hiroshima should be 500 yen on the foreigner bus fare rather than whatever the train fare is, Osaka-Okayama/Kurashiki-Tottori/Matsue should not be more than 10000 yen between one-way Sanyo Shinkansen and the JR West pass for this region, Kyoto and Osaka should be grouped together so that you can fly from Kyushu to Tokyo rather than wasting a day on transportation between Oita-Osaka and Osaka-Tokyo.
*I currently don’t have each day planned out, but more of a “these are the things I’d like to see and do at some point in this city,” is that a good idea?*
Kind of depend. In a big city or a city where the attractions are spread out (like Tokyo and Kyoto) it can make sense to group things by sections of the city. Not thinking about that, you might end up going from one side of the city to the other over and over in the same day and going to the same area days after days. Some planning and awareness of the location of things is also important.
For JR Pass, if you break even… it’s ok, any extra would be free, easy to book tickets online. But if the pass is more expensive than the individual tickets, then it’s easy, just buy individual tickets. Could also check doing Osaka after Kyoto and flying from Oita airport to Tokyo, that would save even more than flying to Osaka.
Kyoto, you have Kiyomizu-dera twice.
Echizen is technically doable as a day trip, make sure you research the places where you can buy knives and see things. I’ve been to Sakai (side note, Sakai is a city in Osaka prefecture, ok, it’s divided in wards and there is one called Sakai, where you likely want to go, but still, it’s Sakai city, anyway). Going to Sakai, you should make sure you know where you want to go to buy knives. You think you can go to a blacksmith and buy directly from them… nah… most do not sell, they make it then send the blade to people who sharpen it, then they send it to people who put the handle on (that can be the seller, who often brand the knives with the name of their store). Tthink you can see them work…. nah… only if you have some appointments and someone to guide you. Going to Sakai was a bit of a disappointment for me, I expected to be able to see people working as there is even address in the city flyers, the local craft museum is nice and they sell knives there (got one) but you would possibly have more choice just walking Kappabashi street in Tokyo and going to all the shops looking at what they sell.
I have nothing against Matsue, but seems a bit odd going there for what… maybe one day ?
Nara is not a ward of Osaka, it’s a city in the prefecture of the same name.
When you return to Tokyo, go to Asakusa and pass by Kappabashi to go see all the kitchen stuff, including lot of stores selling knives.