Just to preface, I do know that it’s usually advised to travel by car as little as possible. I intend for this to be a 4-5 day road trip from Aomori to Kyoto to end a 22 day trip. I have left this quite late to book because the tail end of my trip was a little up in the air whether I did it solo or had friends with me and this meant the accom dates were flipping a bit.
The plan now is I’m going to be driving through mountainous areas where I am expecting snow, but I’m planning to avoid any heavy falls or snowstorms if need be. I’ll be doing the drive in early March and I am intending on getting an AWD mini-crossover SUV at a minimum up to a RAV4 at the largest. I don’t want smaller that a mini SUV because I’d like to have the slightly better capability if need be, and I don’t want bigger than a RAV because of manoeuvrability for the times I might be in small cities. I’ve driven in alpine conditions before and through mountainous areas *a lot* and I plan to stay in mostly urban areas after driving through rural areas and seeing remote sights during the day. I’ve lived in NZ and Aus all my life, so always drive on the left side. I’ve learned some very basic conversational Japanese and can read katakana, hiragana, and minimal Kanji, but discussing with friends they believe I know enough to get by when it comes to understanding road signs and directions. I’m also looking at booking direct through the Japanese rental companies (Toyota, nippon, orix, etc) to make sure I don’t get rorted by the western players.
With that all said, I have a couple questions in case anyone can help me:
– Are there any rental car relocation services in Japan which are like transfercar, imoova, or the like where if rental cars need to be transported from one location to another over certain dates, you could book the rental for a decreased rate? While I had budgeted more than enough for the rental, if there’s a way I can save on the one way charge I’d be open to it.
– What’s the easiest way to plan routes and predicting tolls? Is google maps the best tool to use or are there other options specific to Japan that would be better?
– Does anyone have a specific location or anything they’d like to shout out between Aomori and Kyoto, probably sticking to either the west or centre of Honshu since I’m not planning currently to see much of the east on the road trip? I’m particularly interested in cultural or nature sites.
– Does my plan around what car to have and why make sense or is needing an SUV for these areas overkill?
– Finally, are there many areas where there is extremely restricted resources for a fair distance (eg, no service stations, shops or reception for over 100km at a time) in the northern/central parts of Honshu?
Thanks in advance for any advice, feel free to tell me is any of the plan or the plan on the whole is stupid. Still have time and the budget to change some things if need be!