jt4

My husband and I are planning to travel from Hakone (Odawara) to Nagoya via Ise (Iseshi) while travelling in Japan next April. We would like to explore the shrine area at Ise for a couple of hours before continuing on to Nagoya but are unsure whether or not there are luggage storage lockers available at the railway station in Ise (Iseshi). Can anyone help us with this information. Thanks

mrwunrfl

You probably will be traveling to Ise via Nagoya, not the other way around. Ise is not enroute from Odawara to Nagoya.

First you take JR from Odawara to Nagoya (check the schedule and try to get a Hikari shinkansen for that leg and you will save an hour vs taking a Kodama shinkansen). From Nagoya you take a Kintetsu limited express train to Iseshi.

Best would be to ship your luggage to you lodging in Nagoya. Supposing that you are stopping at Hakone for a night after Tokyo then you could ship from Tokyo. Take a small bag to Hakone.

You can store your stuff at JR Nagoya station. The Kintetsu Nagoya station might have lockers, but I don't remember. The Iseshi station is a small one. I think it does have lockers but not many. I would not count on finding two large lockers there or even at Nagoya.

It is an 80 minute train ride each way between Nagoya and Ise. With finding lockers at Nagoya, changing stations, waiting for the trains, it will cost about 4 hours getting there and back. That's after the trip from Hakone to Odawara to JR Nagoya.

There are two shrine areas in Ise. It is a good day trip from Nagoya to visit the shrines. Might be better to stay a night or two and explore the area some more.

jt4

Thanks for the suggestions. We were thinking of doing the following to avoid the luggage storage problem

Leave 9.10 Hakone (Odawara)
Arrive 10.22 Nagoya
Store luggage in Nagoya
Leave 11.30 Nagoya
Arrive 12.56 Iseshi
Explore Iseshi
Leave 5.05 Iseshi
Arrive 6.41 Nagoya

but might reconsider and spend the night in Ise instead of heading back to Nagoya. We are heading to Takayama after Ise so could travel Ise to Nagoya to Takayama but not sure if this is feasible. Any more suggestions?

mrwunrfl

There is a Marriott Associa hotel that looked like it was attached to Nagoya station. North to south in the complex, IIRC, is Marriott, JR, Kintetsu. There are other hotels nearby the station. So you could stash your stuff at a hotel and come back after Ise. This would make the luggage handling a sure thing but would take some time.

You could take the earlier Hikari train from Odawara. The extra two hours would give you enough time to make the last l'ex to Takayama. That would be a busy day.

There are taxis waiting in front of Ise station, but they may decline to take you to the smaller shrine. Typically you would walk to the lesser shrine then catch a bus to the other one. The bus back to Ise station was pretty quick but did not stop exactly at the station, but that may have been due to some construction last April (it was only 2 walk from the stop to station).

Unless the shrines in Ise are part of your religion then I am not sure this stop is worth the effort.

The Kintetsu train is not covered by a JR Pass.

mrwunrfl

I see that you found the schedule for the JR Rapid Mie train between Iseshi and Nagoya. I thought that I took JR to Iseshi but only saw the Kintetsu train on the schedule at hyperdia. But I now recall that the bus from the shrine to the JR station stopped at a non-JR station on the way.

jt4

Thanks for your ideas. I am now puzzling over the train from Nagoya to Takayama. Does anyone know if the LTD.EXP (WIDEVIEW)HIDA 1 from Nagoya to Takayama is a JR train i.e. able to be used with a JR Pass?

jt4

PS Not only the HIDA 1 but any of the
LTD.EXP (WIDEVIEW)HIDA?

mrwunrfl

Yes, those are JR limited express trains that you can use with your JR Pass. So you will be able to take JR from Odawara to Ise to Takayama.

jt4

Thanks for your help.