Honeymoon in Tokyo + beach destination

Time of 'year', not time of 'tea'!

Why not Okinawa?

Phuket in August? It's rainy season and not only are you very likely to have a lot of rain, but the water will be rough and not clear and calm like you want for snorkeling.

You could opt for an island in the Gulf of Thailand, like Koh Samui, but it's a long flight (6+ hours to Bangkok) and will entail a change of planes. I immediately thought of Bali, but again, it's a very long flight. (Asia is huge - Tokyo to Singapore is an 8 hour flight, Bali is another hour plus beyond.)

You might want to consider a place in the Philippines, as they have some very nice beaches.

Unless you opt for Okinawa, Japan doesn't combine well with Asian beach destinations. You'll already have a long flight from London, you probably don't want another long flight within Asia.

I posted a while ago about requesting info for a trip to Tokyo + Thailand, no trip report posted, but it was 5 months after our wedding/honeymoon, but this was a great honeymoon trip! Anyone with a good sense of geography knows Bangkok is far from Japan, but we spent 5 days in Tokyo then flew out to Bangkok and tranferred to a smaller aircraft to Koh Samui. We stayed at Sala Samui and if I could design the perfect honeymoon hotel, that would be the place. We spent 4 days there and despite the rain (it rained on and off) we couldn't have been happier. Private pool inside your own little walled-in room. It's a whole day of travel to get from Tokyo (NRT) to Koh Samui, but totally worth it to experience the contrast of wonderful Tokyo (we are planning our trip back right now) and the most beautiful beaches. Good luck.

My first suggestion is actually that you seriously consider Hawaii, as it is an easy overnight flight from Tokyo and there are frequent flights. (Hawaii is popular with Japanese tourists.) Weather is good in August, probably the best all year in many parts of the islands. It has some really beautiful beaches and tons of activities. As 5 days is short, you might want to stick to just one island. Not sure about fights back to the UK from there, or whether you want to go through the trouble to apply for a visa for the US, but look into flights and see what works.

Okinawa may work as well, I don’t know much about it. I think you may find it to be rainy, see weatherbase.com and other weather websites. As it is just north of Taiwan, which does have a good bit of rain and typhoons in August, it may have the same issues. Guam and Micronesia are going to be rainy as far as I know. Micronesia is a bit harder to get to for such a short time. Guam is a bit overdeveloped, IMO, but there are flights from Tokyo. You might try the Northern Mariana Islands, as they are close and appear to be in a bit better weather than Guam and Micronesia in August. I have not been so don’t have any specific advice, I understand that Saipan is somewhat developed.

I agree weather in August may be an issue in many places. Bali would be a strong contender, as there is a JAL non-stop which takes 7 hours and some connecting options that take about 10 hours. Weather is very good in August, virtually no rain. My only caveat is that the beaches may not be quite what you are expecting, IMO, its much more about the culture and beauty of the inland areas more than the beaches. It’s a magical place, but perhaps not the very best choice if all you want to do is lie on a beach. But tons of things to do and see.

You might look at Vietnam, someplace like Nha Trang or the Halong Bay area if you can get a good connecting flight from Ho Chi Min or Hanoi. Again, it will be a long flight from Tokyo, which is so far north.

I agree that Phuket is going to be rainy in August and that the east coast of Thailand or Malaysia are going to be better choices. I agree that you may have some challenges with flights to get to a place like Koh Samui from Tokyo with only 5 days.

The Philippines, while beautiful, is quite rainy and tends toward typhoons in August.

A final thought is that you go to the Maldives, as it would be on the way back, and there are some decent flight options from Tokyo (again a popular place with Japanese), like going on Malaysian airlines via a short layover in Kuala Lumpur. It is the rainy season there, but I have to say that even their thunderstorms are beautiful. When the sun is out, its hard to beat for stunning beaches. Caveat there is that five days is short given the long flight times in and out, and the fact that many flights arrive and depart in the evening, so pick a hotel which is reachable by boat rather than seaplane, as seaplanes cannot fly at night, and you don’t want to waste a night or two having to overnight at the airport hotel.

You might want to look at the weather for Tokyo as well for August, as it might be wetter than you want or were expecting. (It has twice the average rainfall of London in August.) Also, if I can make an editorial comment, to go all the way to Japan and only see Tokyo seems like a waste of time and effort to see a huge (albeit clean) city with not an overwhelming amount of tourist sites. A place like Kyoto or Osaka would be more interesting, IMO.

quinlad, Bali is a good choice for a honeymoon and the weather in August is about as good as it gets. The downside (aside from the travel time) is that August is also peak season for European and Australian travelers and rates are high and availability low.

There are many, many choices of accommodation in Bali -- both on the beach and inland. As mentioned Bali's beaches are not the white sand, turquoise water type -- they're lively and touristed and often have aggressive surf. The inland area around Ubud offers phenomenal natural beauty and fascinating arts and culture.

In Bali itself my first choices for a honeymoon would be The Legian in Seminyak, Como Shambhala outside of Ubud and the Amankila on the eastcoast.

Aside from the wonderful resorts, Bali also offer short-term villa rentals that could be a good choice for a honeymoon. You could get a villa with pool, butler/maid, cook and driver near (but not on) the beach. These are all quite pricy. There are plenty of less expensive but equally atmospheric places as well.

If your budget can afford it you should look at the Aman resort properties in other locations like Moyo Island and the Philippines.

One more slight (or perhaps substantial) advantage to going to Hawaii is that you will “gain” a day because you will cross the date line. For example, if you leave Tuesday at 7:30 pm from Tokyo, you will arrive at 7:30 am on Tuesday morning in Hawaii. This gives you both a day in Tokyo and a day in Hawaii, which you might otherwise lose flying to other places in Asia, esp if the flights are daytime flights, which tends to be the case with inter-Asia flights (i.e., you might spend most of Tuesday flying to Bali, thereby missing time in Tokyo and also not being able to do any sightseeing in Bali until Wednesday). On the way back, you will fly overnight via a change in the US (appears that Seattle or San Fran are the best choices, although you probably have many options) which in some way means the day you gained is lost, but you more than likely will have the same issue flying back from Asia where a night flight is probably going to be the best option as well.

One other advantage is that going London-Tokyo-Hawaii-London would most likely mean you could buy an around-the-world fare, which are usually cheaper. However, if you don’t mind spending the time, you may qualify for this if you go from Tokyo to some other destination in Asia and then fly back to London via the US or Canada (i.e. you have to fly east for most portions of the flights to qualify for an around the world fare). I don’t know all the rules, but you might look into them.

As promised, a while back, here is the Izu info from a very helpful website. Haven't yet had a chance to stay there but the owners were very helpful at answering questions.

http://izu-sakuraya.jp/english/

Oops, I promised this info to someone else, not this OP, but it is beach info in Japan regardless.