My husband and I are taking our almost 2year old to Japan for 20 days over march/April. Should hopefully be prime Sakura season 🤞🏻
Below is our loose itinerary. As this is our third trip and we have a tiny dictator with us I thought it best to keep it *minimalist*. Planning on doing heaps of playgrounds/parks and hanami this time around.
Looking for recs on kid friendly spaces for a toddler to not be out of place. Considering Anpan Man Museum or Puroland as well as doing both Disney parks.
My son is a fairly placid little dude and historically has been pretty good to travel with. He enjoys the outdoors and all things animals, teletubbies, initial D and Pokémon.
I’ve also included a list of every day things we *think* will make life easier based on previous travel with our son *but* we’ve never been on a flight with him longer than 3 hours or been away from home for more than 4 days. Seeking Parent to parent advice- equipment check and pacing for this age check.
Day 0 Thursday- land in haneda stay at hotel in haneda airport
Day 1 Friday- change hotels to Asakusa- sensoji/sky tree/ find a local park
Day 2 Saturday – morning park run, Pokémon dx and dinner out
Day 3 Sunday – nakano -watch shopping and vintage Disney hunting, near by park?
Day 4 Monday – Disneyland
Day 5 Tuesday – ikebukoro- Pokémon centre and ghibli shop. Explore sunshine city maybe aquarium or ramen st
Day 6 Wednesday – team labs planets
Day 7 Thursday- harajuku/shibuya – yoyogi park hanami, Nintendo shop.
Day 8 Friday – travel day – Shinkansen to Kyoto check in and explore area near hotel
Day 9 Saturday- imperial palace hanami
Day 10 Sunday- OSAKA DAY??? Castle and dotombori, ramen at our fave spot.
Day 11 Monday- fushimi inari
Day 12 Tuesday- pagoda/temple Hanamikoji
Day 13 Wednesday- kinkaku-ji
Day 14 Thursday- arashiyama hanami and explore
Day 15 Friday -travel day- Tokyo check in ginza
Day 16 Saturday -Ginza art aquarium
Day 17 Sunday- Ginza street food and explore
Day 18 Monday- DisneySea
Day 19 Tuesday – Chidorigafuchi boat ride/hanami
Day 20 Wednesday -travel day- hang around Ginza/shibuya until about 4:30
flight at 9:30pm.
*Parenting equipment check*
Carrier, travel stroller, baby monitor (2bedroom hotel), bed rail, compact toys, panadol/nurofen/teething gel, white noise machine, sleeping stuff from home.
4 comments
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Some comments:
Day 0: why do you stay in a hotel in Haneda? Getting to downtown Tokyo from Haneda is about 30 minutes on a bus, depending where you are going. Checking in will take more time than that.
Day 7: I’d avoid Hanami in Yoyogi park like a plague, twice so with a toddler. There are plenty of better places for that, be it Shinjuku Gyoen or just along Meguro river. Gyoen is good with kids, because it’s enclosed and you can let them run free without worrying about cars. Besides, it’s impossible to know on which day Sakura will be at its best. It stays at full bloom for a couple of days, no more, so you might need some flexibility.
Day 8: Shinkansen doesn’t take the whole day, it would be very meaningful to add something more.
Day 17: Ginza is literally a street with high-street boutiques, like Prada, Ferrari and what not. There is no street food, absolute zero. And to be fair, street food is something more typical for Thailand, much less likely for Japan. Otherwise it’s a fine plan, but might be boring for the kid…
Day 19: most likely Sakura will be completely gone by that day. But it depends on a year.
As someone else mentioned, Yoyogi for hanami might be a bit overwhelming. You have it planned for a weekday so that’s definitely better, but the amount of people (and trash–and crows, so many crows…) might not be the best place for enjoying it. Albeit every place will be crowded, I’d personally maybe try to venture out of central Tokyo. (Mitaka, for example.) If you are set on Yoyogi, entering via Shibuya (it’s a bit of a walk, but nice) can help you avoid the crowd from Harajuku station. The access from Harajuku is limited to very narrow sidewalks and very narrow, people-packed bridge crosswalks.
We have a toddler and live in Japan and around age 2 seems to be ideal for Anpanman Museum (we’ve been to the one in Yokohama). My kid had only the vaguest idea who Anpanman was at the time and still really loved it.
Honestly with a toddler I wouldn’t want to do Disney, but would instead focus on some of the “kid tourism spots” instead which I feel are more toddler-friendly and toddler-sizes. But I’m also not a huge fan of Disney parks in general so…
There’s a ton of new indoor play places, cool artsy parks, chic kid-friendly cafes, etc. I follow a couple of instagram accounts to find them. It’s all in Japanese, but a picture is worth a 1000 words and the names of the places are all listed.
[Mamatalk](https://instagram.com/mamatalk_jp?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=)
[Mappy](https://instagram.com/mappy_odekake?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=)
[Otona to kodomo trip](https://instagram.com/otonatokodomo_trip?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=)
Also, I don’t know where you are in your toilet training journey, but I recommend [Mamapapamap](https://apps.apple.com/us/app/mamapapamap-nursing-room-map/id1117756080) for information about restrooms, changing facilities, etc.