Hello all! I will be departing for the Kansai region in about two weeks from today and I'd like to seek your valuable recommendations and insights on my itinerary. I will be traveling with my girlfriend and looking to spend up to a moderate amount. All of my accommodations are already booked, so I'm not looking to shaking up the itinerary too much. Any advice on the best way to navigate around the Kansai region will be much appreciated as I'm still honestly pretty confused about how the rail system works in Japan.
2nd Aug (Fri)
– Arrive at Osaka KIX airport in the mid-afternoon
– Check in hotel at Namba, settle down
– Dinner at Dotonbori
a. Are there any noteworthy items I need to pick up at KIX to make my trip easier?
b. What is the best (cost and time efficient) way from KIX to my hotel at Namba?
3rd Aug (Sat)
– Breakfast (at Namba or Umeda)
– Umeda Sky Building (AM)
– Osaka Museum of Housing and Living (AM/PM)
– Osaka Castle (PM)
– Tenjinbashi (Night)
c. I'm looking to purchase the 1-day Osaka e-Pass to use for this day. Does anyone have any experience with using this pass?
4th Aug (Sun)
– Kobe day trip
– Kobe Chinatown
– Kobe Port
– Back to Osaka (night)
d. I'm aware that there is a train from Osaka Namba to Kobe (Hanshin Main Line), but I couldn't find anything more about this. If anyone has any experience traveling from Namba to Kobe (and back), your advise will be much appreciated
e. I don't intend to leave Kobe without trying the famed Kobe beef – recommendations are welcomed!
5th Aug (Mon)
– Check out of hotel at Namba
– Osaka Cup Noodles Museum
– Check in AirBNB around USJ (3pm)
– Shin-Osaka
f. It's hard to plan around this day because we'll be checking out of our hotel in Namba and moving to an AirBNB that is nearer to USJ. Currently, we intend to check out from our hotel in Namba and bring along our luggages to the Cup Noodles Museum, but I'm not quite sure if the metro will bring us there. Either way, this is intended to be a "chill" day for us.
6th Aug (Tue)
– USJ
g. I'm sure this deserves a thread by itself and there are plenty of guides out there for USJ already. Still, any advise on navigating USJ in early August will be much appreciated!
7th Aug (Wed)
– Check out of AirBNB
– Osaka to Nara
– Nara Deer Park
– Lunch at Nara
– Nara to Kyoto
– Check in hotel at Kyoto
h. We intend to stop by the popular Nara deer park on our way to Kyoto as we've heard that we only need a good 4-6 hours to do everything there is to do at Nara. I'm more concerned about the transportation though – I'm thinking of getting a JR Kansai Mini Pass for traveling around Kyoto in the next 3 days. Does anybody have any recommendations or on this?
8th Aug (Thur)
– Lake Biwa day trip
i. We'll be looking to either join a tour group for a day trip, but any recommendations on how to do a Lake Biwa day trip are most welcomed. I know that I could use the JR Kansai Area Pass to do a loop around the lake, but I'm just not sure how feasible this is if the train frequencies allow me to get on/get off to explore the highlights of the lake.
9th Aug (Fri)
– Check out hotel
– Arashiyama Bamboo Forest
– Gion
– Check in to Ryokan near Gion
– Fushimi Inari
j. Staying in a proper Ryokan (with dinner and breakfast) is one of the must-do on our list, but we're not quite sure how else to spend the rest of the day. The Bamboo Forest is a must visit, even though it's a little out of the way for us. We are wondering if it is possible to do Fushimi Inari from 9PM-12MN as it's one of the places that it is opened 24hrs.
10th Aug (Sat)
– Fushimi Inari
– Kinkaku-ji
– Back to Osaka
11th Aug (Sun)
– Last minute shopping at Osaka
– End of trip
In summary:
2nd Aug Airport to Osaka City
3rd Aug within Osaka
4th Aug Osaka to Kobe (Hanshin Namba Line)
5th Aug within Osaka
6th Aug within Osaka (USJ)
7th Aug Osaka to Nara (start JR Kansai Area pass)
8th Aug within Kyoto
9th Aug within Kyoto (JR Kansai Area pass expire)
10th Aug Kyoto to Osaka
11th Aug Osaka City to Airport
In addition to the above pointers, we're interested in partaking in cultural/people-oriented activities if anyone has any recommendations to share. Thank you!
by Sure_Initiative5078