Critique my itinerary please! 🙏

11 comments

1. What you have listed for Nara requires a full day. It will be a really worthwhile day, but Nara is a big place and it takes time to see things.

   Beyond that, this a very much a Japan 101 type of itinerary. There’s nothing at all wrong with that, but it’s hard to see what your interests are. I’d suggest researching what you can do in Japan that aligns with your personal preferences.

2. maybe i misunderstood your plans for day 10, but Tokyo Tower is 30 minutes by train from Shibuya Sky so you can’t really use it as a replacement. especially since you want to do other things in Shibuya afterwards. also walking from Takeshita Street to Roppongi takes 40 minutes according to Google. this is perfectly doable of course, but keep in mind that you might be quite tired from all the walking at this point.

   you should choose between planets and borderless soon and then book a ticket asap, because it looks like borderless is still popular enough that it sells out in advance.

   I also agree with the other commenter that Nara alone takes a full day, especially since most shrine/ temple things close between 4 and 5pm. and Todaiji for example can’t be entered at all after closing time since they shut the gates to the temple grounds. so only arriving in the afternoon means missing out on things. the same is true for Uji though. Byodoin also closes at 5:30pm and the last entrance to the phoenix Hall is at 4pm or so. you will have to choose what is more important to you.

3. It’s too much for each day. You will be doing Marathon or Amazing race with that. I even only pick morning, afternoon, and night activity and end up at 2x places a day. Allow time for travel plus breakfast lunch dinner too, if you go to famous restaurant waiting time will slow you down.

   Prioritise 2-3 that must go in a day, the rest just as extra if you have time. If you are solo travel, it is fine, but with family, prepare for disappointment.

   Once you go to one or two temple shrines, the next one will look almost the same. Some of the Tori gate and bridges too are quite similar. Take time to enjoy, some areas you can find some cute place that you can find on every corner.

4. Itami has a limousine bus you should take, but you can only bring one suitcase and a small carry one (like a backpack)
   JR pass is not worth it for your trip
   I prefer Nikko over the other 3 for day 13 because I love valleys! But you might be bored of temples by then as there’s not the highest variation in look between them all

5. IIRC the best way from ITM to Kyoto is the airport bus takes about an hour. https://en.japantravel.com/article/osaka-itami-to-kyoto-the-easy-way/603

   IMO you’re trying to fit in too much and mixing things that are not really well connected. Travel time from Fushimi Inari to Daigo-Ji is about 40 min. And also 40 min from Fushimi Inari to Nazen-Ji and 40 min from Nazenji to Nishiki Market. Note also that Nishiki Market is best visited late afternoon. A lot of things close after 6 PM. (I was just there last Sunday).

   To really experience Fushimi Inari is about a 2-3 hour tour in the absence of crowds. So, including travel time that can easily take half a day in itself.

   I spent an hour at Kiyomizu Dera last Wednesday (6-7 AM, few crowds at that time and I’ve been there before) but few of the shops on the road there and ninenzaka are open at that time.

6. Skip the lucky cat temple. It is just a shelf of maneki neko; and the temple is getting sick of tourists. They still may be roping off the cats.

7. I suggest you calculate how much time you need to travel to Hiroshima from Kyoto before you consider a day trip from there. It’s 2.5 hrs from Kyoto Station. It’ll be better to stay there overnight.

8. You have far too much for each day. Choose one or two places (late morning and afternoon) for Tokyo for each day.

   Like far, far too many other people, you seem to have read something about Gotokuji’s being a ‘lucky cat temple’. It’s no such thing, and it’s now so overcrowded with tourists that (a) most of the grounds have been closed off to casual visitors and (b) people who live in the area are now actively avoiding the area of the temple. (The Gotokuji shopkeepers’ association encourages the association with the *manaki-neko* figurines and story, but the actual grounds of the temple are mundane.) The Gotokuji neighborhood is a nice one and a few hundred meters from our home, but we’ve stopped going there because of the numbers of tourists.

9. Get a suica load it up 5k is plenty and get a jr pass and use it for every jr line one i got has unlimited uses for 21 days and even covers bullet train tickets for free also good luck doin allat, be warned get breathable clothes otherwise youll stink and not much you can do about walking.

10. Damn dude this is wayyyy too much every day. I get wanting to make the most of your trip but you’re on vacation, don’t overload yourself. Also it doesn’t matter how early you wake up, a lot of places don’t open til 10 or 11 every day so you will have to wait til mid morning for almost everything. When I’m in Japan I wake up at like 4 or 5 am, you can’t really get your day started for most things until at least 9, especially in Tokyo. You can walk around but any shop/restaurant/museum/attraction is going to be closed in the early morning. Also I recommend staying overnight in Hakone instead of doing two separate day trips to hakone/mt fuji back to back. Hakone is awesome and it’s worth an overnight stay

11. So many people try this but Hiroshima and Miyajima are NOT A DAY TRIP from Kyoto or Osaka. It will take you three hours to get to Hiroshima at the least. You’ll never be able to do your morning itinerary in Hiroshima, that would take you most of the day. Miyajima alone is a day trip just from Hiroshima. Will take you at least 1hr 30 mins just to get there from Hiroshima and the same back, plus to see the island properly it takes hours to walk around. Unless you are going to stay the night in Hiroshima you’ll have to cut Miyajima.