Japan Itinerary feedback please
 

We're going to have 17 days in Japan (inc 2 travel days) and I'd like some feedback on this possible itinerary. We enjoy historic sites, gardens, nature (mountains & ocean), shrines & temples. Below are the cities we'll sleep in:

Day 1 - Tokyo (arrive 5 pm)
Day 2 - Tokyo
Day 3 - Tokyo
Day 4 - Hakone
Day 5 - Takayama
Day 6 - Takayama or Shirakawago
Day 7 - Kyoto
Day 8 - Kyoto
Day 9 - Kyoto
Day 10 - Kyoto
Day 11 - Mt Koyo
Day 12 - Takamatsu
Day 13 - Matsuyama
Day 14 - Matsuyama
Day 15 - Matsuyama
Day 16 - Osaka
Day 17 - Fly home out of Osaka (3 pm flight)

Day trips aren't listed out yet but will include Kamakura &/or Nikko (from Tokyo), Himeji castle (from Kyoto?), & Nara from Kyoto. When in Matsuyama we're planning a bike ride along the inland sea (Shimanami Kaido route).

Is the order a good one, or should we change things around? # of days OK? We were going to cut out Tokyo but decided there's plenty of things to see there (as well as a good base for day trips).

In Kyoto, I'd recommend day trips to Ohara and Kibune/Kurama. Personally, I'd skip Nikko and Mt. Koya. They are totally overrated and many people are disappointed. You can stay in a temple at other places besides Mt. Koya - which is rather commercial and full of concrete. Kamakura is great, so is Hakone. You didn't mention staying at an onsen. Your trip won't be complete without staying at a traditional onsen in the countryside, especially since you like nature. Cherry blossom time is a great time to be in Kyoto. Very magical.

It looks okay to me, because you're giving yourself time to explore using two great bases from which to do day trips. I have to strongly second the recommendation for Ohara-it is quite simply one of the most beautiful and interesting places in all of Japan-I always tell people who are going to Kyoto to also go to Ohara, and those who've gone have never been disappointed.

The road in Ohara splits and at one end of the road lies the Buddhist nunnery of Jakko-in, in this lovely farming community surrounded by mountains, and at the opposite end, the Buddhist temple and monastery of Enryaku-ji/Sanzen-in. The story of Jakko-in is actually quite sad, and is detailed in the Tale of the Heike and Genji. There is an ancient belfry and a perfect little garden which houses the Empress Kenreimon's tomb-the Empress founded the nunnery after she was rescued by her clan's enemies from death in a great battle around the 1100's-she became a nun to pray for her drowned son and other dead relatives. There is a certain atmosphere of sadness here, but also of great serenity and beauty. Recently, I was shocked to read that the nunnery buildings burned to the ground in 1999-however, it was being rebuilt, and was supposed to re-open in 2004. It would be great if someone could go there and report if the nunnery bldgs. have in fact been rebuilt.

The other great sites in Ohara are the temple and monastery of Enryaku-ji/Sanzen-in, which was founded sometime in the 700's. The garden at this temple is stunningly beautiful in summer-it's also a bit of a hike to get to, but there are plenty of little shops and refreshment stands along the way, as quite a few Japanese, but hardly any westerners,(or so it seemed to me) do some sightseeing here. Go on the web and see if you can find pictures of this temple and its garden, and you will see what I mean. Sanzen-in houses a large Amida Buddha, and you can sit awhile outside the rooms of the temple (some of which are open to the outside) in this idyllic setting and listen to the monks chanting their prayers. Ohara is truly a must-see, and it's an easy day trip from Kyoto.

Your trip sounds great - how will you be getting from place to place? Car or train?

Another vote for Ohara which was a definite high point for me. I's also strongly recommend going to the Miho Museum outside of Kyoto. I'd skip Nikko and add at least one or two more days in Kyoto. I was disappointed in Takayama.

Thanks for the opinions & suggestions. We'll be getting a rail pass and will also take local buses if neccessary.

Anyone else been disapointed by Mt Koyo &/or Takayama? Suggestions on good replacements?

Looks like good itinerary. Three nights in Matsuyama might be too many. I read about Shimanami Kaido, see the link here:
http://www.kancycling.com/Destinatio...tinations.html

Looks like the route is almost 80 km and goes between Imabari and Onomichi and the webpage author discusses staying overnight enroute.

Haven't been to Mt Koyo, but loved Takayama.

It is a smaller mountain town with an old merchant section still intact on two streets. Lots of the shops sell the same souvenirs that you find elsewhere, yet some have some really beautiful crafts and art.

The float museum was interesting,as well as some of the old merchant homes and the toy museum. I loved the walk above town that takes you from temple to temple.

There are several inns that are not what you'd think of as traditional, but are a very good example of the kinds of places that japanese love to go away to--good baths, incredible japanese meals, lots of beer and sake and group singing.

We rented bicycles and had a good time cruising out to the village with restored farmhouses. Also had fun just wandering the open market and the little modern shops- found some really unusual toys, fishing lures, staionery, and japanese craft supplies at very reasonable prices.

Overall, a nice visit. Its also a good place to escape the summer heat.

We're going to Japan before New Years and are trying to see if we have time to get there and see it in the winter.

The Spring Takayama Festival is when the floats that lcuy mentioned are carried in a procession around town. The museum has a guide on tape that said that during that festival the population of Takayama swells to something like five times it's year-round size (something like 60,000 year round residents, 300,000 during the festival). The festival is held on/about April 14-15.

Bonjour Alan,

If you can, take one more day in Takamatsu so you can visit Yashima plateau and Shikoku-Mura (about 70 traditional houses moved on the ground of a former castle at the foot of Yashima plateau). Ritsurin gardens are well worth a visit too (allow at least 2 hours). You might also want to visit one of the oldest kabuki theater, recently restored, in Kotohira.

http://www.city.takamatsu.kagawa.jp/english/

http://www.japan-guide.com/e/e5452.html


The tourist office in Takamatsu will give you maps and informations in English. They don't speak much English, though.

We just returned from Japan, and the highlights for us were Koya-san, Nikko, Kyoto (of course), Nara and Himeji. We went to Takayama, but prefered Mt. Koya (especially the cemetery) over Takayama. However, Takayama also was interesting, and we were not disappointed.
We found very, very few tourists in late August in Japan, and Mt. Koya was practically deserted during a mid-week trip. Unless you are going during a peak period when it would be overrun with tourists, I suggest keeping Mt. Koya in your itinerary.

We had timed Takayama and Mt Koyo for weekdays (Day 1 of our trip is a Friday)with the hope that they won't be as crowded. If we keep Takayama on our itinerary we'll probably shorten it to one night and add the other on to Kyoto and day trip to one of the suggested places.

I appreciate the info on Takamatsu and things to do from there. Perhaps we'll do 2 nights there and 2 in Matsuyama.

Train questions: Tokyo to Hakone seems straightforward, but to go from there to Takayama do we have to go back to Tokyo first? From Takayama, what train line will take us to Kyoto?

From Hakone you would go to Odawara station. From Odawara you can get a shinkansen to Nagoya then a limited express train to Takayama.

Most of the shinkansen leaving Odawara are Kodama shinkansen which make frequent stops. The Kodama is like (is) a shinkansen "local" train and has a frequency of 2 or 3 per hour at Odawara. The Kodama train makes 8 stops between Odawara and Nagoya and takes 2 hr 10 min.

The Hikari train goes through Odawara less often. It goes non-stop between Odawara in 1 hr 12 min, so it really is a bullet train. Here is what the schedule of departures from Odawara bound for Nagoya is like: 7:10, 9:10, 11:10, 14:10, 16:10, ...

You can get reserved seats on the Hikari train in advance and then know what time you need to get to Odawara station.

Oddly enough, the JR line that runs thru Takayama is called the Takayama line. I think that there is one lex train a day that goes from Takayama to Kyoto, but all the rest go to Nagoya where you would hop a shinkansen to Kyoto.

If you miss a Hikari train from Odawara to Nagoya, you could take a shinkansen north to Shin-Yokohama, Shinagawa, or Tokyo and then get a Hikari shinkansen to Nagoya. You can get a Hikari nonstop from Tokyo to Nagoya that takes 1 hr 46 min.

Mealea wrote "You can stay in a temple at other places besides Mt. Koya - which is rather commercial and full of concrete." I've heard mixed reviews of Koya-san (Ben and others gave it a thumbs up but others were disapointed).

We'd like to consider options. Where else could we stay in a temple and get a glimpse into the lives of the monks (participate in prayers, etc.)? Is there somewhere nice in Kyoto itself? That might free up time for use to go from Hakone to Matsumoto, then Takayama. If we did those 3 mountain cities with 4 nights, which place should get the extra day?

On your last question: either Hakone or Takayama.

What route(s) are you considering for going from Matsumoto to Takayama?

In my "Skip Tokyo?" thread, you gave a suggestion of "...visiting the castle at Matsumoto (after Hakone) and then travelling down the Kiso Valley or travelling across the mountains via Kamikochi to Takayama (and on to Shirakawago and then the Kenrokuen gardens in Kanzaawa, then south to Kyoto)."

That sounds like a wonderful route, but it also sounds like it might mean pulling an extra day from somewhere. Perhaps we'd do 1 less on Shikoku, leaving 3 nights to split between Takamatsu & Matsuyama.

Bonjour Alan,

Kyoto offers a number of opportunities for temple lodging (shukubo) and zen experiences. You might have a look here: http://www.kateigaho.com/int/aut04/kyoto-events.html

and here: http://niwashi.net/kyotoinfo/gesshin-in/


I know other temples offer lodging (Myoshin-ji, for a start) but I couldn't locate the info on the JNTO site. You might try asking them or their office nearer to you to send you information ( http://www.jnto.go.jp/eng/ )

We decided to do 1 night in Matsumoto and 1 in Takayama before heading off towards Kyoto. Looking at a map, I'm wondering if it would be better to go Tokyo-Matsumoto-Takayama-Hankone-Kyoto.

BTW, we also decided to skip Mt Koyo and use that as an extra day in Hakone. We'll try to attend meditation while in Kyoto.

I'm also trying to decide if we should to Takamatsu mor Matsuyama first (we're going to spend 2 nights in each). Doesn't seem to make much difference as far as I can tell. On our day 16, we'll take the train to Osaka but stop at Himeji for the afternoon, since we really don't plan to spend much time in Osaka itself (we just wanted to be close to the airport for the flight home).

When you stay in Osaka to fly from Kansai, you should be aware that you are still an hour from the airport. Not a problem by any means, though. There is a terrific bus service that's cheap and efficient.

The Haruka train to Kansai airport does NOT stop at Osaka station, so if you wanted to use that train, you'd have to be in Shin-Osaka or Kyoto or one of the areas closer to the airport (which are not exciting or cheaper or nicer in any way). There are other trains from Osaka station that do go to the airport...they aren't as fast or as nice as the Haruka, but they get you there for less money than the Haruka and you can go from Osaka station on them. The airport bus is what we always use, right from the hotel.

There is a Westin on one side of Osaka station, and on the other side there is a Hilton and a Ritz Carlton. For a 3PM flight, you'd have till lunchtime to relax in your hotel or do some last minute shopping. Being at the Hilton (actually, that's our regular hotel in Osaka) you are connected to a vast network of underground shopping areas, as well as next door to the Hanshin department store, which has a floor of lovely Japanese wood and ceramic things.

For your routing, Toyko, Hakone, Matsumoto, Takayama, Kyoto makes the most sense to me. You should not miss Shirakawa-go. If you were in Kanazawa on a Sunday, you could attend meditation at Daijoji, built in 1261. It's located at the base of the mountains in a lovely area, very beautiful and quiet. Meditation in English is at 1:30 pm.

For your routings, I recommend checking the schedules on hyperdia.com - it will give you and idea of the time required from place to place.

Time-wise, would it be much longer to go from Kyoto via the Haruka train to Kansai airport versus the bus or shuttle from the city center of Osaka? We'd still have our JR rail pass and would prefer Kyoto to Osaka, but didn't want to have to get up very early and make lots of train or bus transfers on our way to the airport.

Since you've got the pass, then stay in Kyoto and take the Haruka. From Kyoto station, you don't change trains at all. You'd have to leave Kyoto around 11:30 or so to be at Kansai airport for a 3:00 pm flight. If you have lots of stuff, you can arrange for your bags to be shipped ahead to the airport. Allow 2 days to be safe. The hotel concierge will be able to arrange the delivery for you and give you boxes if you need them. Cost is around 2000 yen per bag or large box. You pick your things up at the airport at the baggage counter on the check-in floor...really convenient. If you don't need to send stuff ahead, you can easily take a taxi to Kyoto station if you aren't staying in the Granvia hotel in the station.

Thanks! We're traveling light (1 carry-on roller each) so no need to send bags ahead. An extra evening & morning in Kyoto sounds great! We'll contact the Hirota Guest House where we're booked earlier in our trip. The other option is to stay at a temple, if anyone has a suggestion of a place where we could stay and attend morning meditation.

I'm sorry, alan64, I may have given you some bum advice on Matsumoto considering the dates of your travel. If you do a search on this forum for "Elainee" you will see my post titled "Takayama, Shirakawago, Kanazawa bus schedule for Elainee". The schedules say the buses run "from April 21". So, I am doubtful that you would be able to take the (non-JR) buses over the mountains via Kamikochi.

KimJapan, the OP is travelling at the end of March - beginning of April (not sure if you're caught up on his plan; also, at one point he was considering visiting Kumamoto to go river rafting and to see the garden and castle). I don't remember if we covered it on emd's posts, but is Shirakawago even accessible at that time? Considering that Takayama's cherry blossom festival is at the end of April, I'm guessing that Takayama is not going to be very green.

Tokyo- Hakone- Matsumoto- Takayama would be the best route, weather permitting, that is.

Alan-you didn't mention that you were planning a trip to Koyasan, Japan's Buddhist monastery town on the mountains, but Koyasan is where most of the accomodation to be found is at Buddhist temples. You might want to consider going there, if you want to experience an overnight in a monastery, which would include getting up at dawn to sit with the monks and listen to their morning chants-I considered this myself once, long ago, and don't remember now why I didn't do it- but I did get up up very early one time to sit and observe Buddhist rituals in honor of Buddha's birthday in a Kyoto temple-and I can vividly recall that experience many years after the fact, so if you can manage to do this while in Japan I think it would be a most worthwhile experience.

Shirakawa-go is accessible year round, usually...unless there is a big snowstorm, which though not unheard of for the area is highly unusual. Access end of March/early April, no problem. It may involve a rental car...there are buses in the off season, but they are few and far between.

Spygirl: I wanted to let you know that I have been following up on your post here w/the suggestion to visit Ohara, adn I foudn out that the nunnery, Jakko-in, was destroyed by arson, and it will not be rebuilt til 2005 at the earliest, at a cost of several billion yen. See http://dp.iam.com/index/jsp?cid=6928...cationId=29068
I am wondering if it will be open when we go in March.

Well this is really weird. I foudn another site that says the people of Ohara rallied and raise denough to get the nunnery rebuilt and that it opened back up in Nov. 2000!
http://www.city.kyoto.jp/sankan/kank...-6/may_04.html
I guess I won't know til we get there and see.

Well our trip is almost ready to begin, and I wanted to thank everyone for their helpful suggestions. Our final itinerary is:

Day 1 - Tokyo (arrive 5 pm), staying at the Ryokan Shigetsu in Asakusa
Day 2 - Tokyo
Day 3 - Tokyo
Day 4 - Hakone, Ichinoyo ryokan
Day 5 - Hankone
Day 6 - Matsumoto, Marumo ryokan
Day 7 - Takayama, Sumiyoshi ryokan
Day 8 - Kyoto, Hirota Guest House
Day 9 - Kyoto
Day 10 - Kyoto
Day 11 - Kyoto
Day 12 - Matsuyama, Minshuko Miyoshi
Day 13 - Matsuyama
Day 14 - Takamatsu, Takamatsu City Hotel
Day 15 - Nara, Seikan-so ryokan
Day 16 - Fly home out of Osaka (3 pm flight)

Oh wow, so your trip is just starting! And this whole time while I was pouring over your posts to plan my March trip I thought you had gone and come back. Your trip looks great. I really look forward to hearing about your experiences, esp. the ryokan' you've chosen, Maysuyama and Tkayama (both on our future trip itineraries already), as well as Matsumoto and Takamatsu. Bon Voyage! We leave march 12 for Tokyo and Kyoto w/lots of side trips.

Have a great trip alan64, you've got a great itinerary. Will you be travelling via Kamikochi to Takayama? I see that your ryokan in Matsuyama is in the Dogo Onsen area. Please tell me that you will visit the onsen! And buy the extra ticket to go upstairs to the relax room after bath.

emd, I'll be sure to report back after I return in April. We leave out of San Francisco on 3/25/05.

mrwunrfl, you've been a big help in my planning. We definitely are going to visit the Dogo Onsen, and we'll be sure to relax upstairs. I'm also looking forward to renting bikes in Matsuyama to bike around parts of the inland sea.

Regarding travel between Matsumoto and Takayama, we'll have to see what we can do. We'll have a JR rail pass, so we'll probably want to use that if possible. However, if the scenic bus is running and it's not too expensive, we'll certainly consider that. I'd love to view the Kamikochi basin area.

Bonjour Alan,

I see you'll be staying at the Takamatsu City Hotel. I've stayed there twice (2003 March and 2004 May). It's clean, cheap, but breakfast is only so-so. However, its location is fantastic for visiting around, since it is almost in the middle of the main shopping arcade, surrounded by good inexpensive restaurants (the noodle shop next door, yum), a couple greengrocers with delicious fruits, nice kimono and antiques stores, 3 min on foot from the Kotoden train station from where you can go to Yashima plateau and Shikoku village and 15 min on foot from Ritsurin Park.

Do stop by at the tourist office in front of the JR station for some free maps and leaflets.

I wanted to thank everyone whose helped me plan my first trip to Japan. We'll be leaving SF on Friday morning and we're very excited.

Bon voyage, alan64. Pack some extra patience and have a wonderful time!

A reply to Spygirl's post of 9/10/2004
Spygirl: I have to strongly second the recommendation for Ohara-it is quite simply one of the most beautiful and interesting places in all of Japan-I always tell people who are going to Kyoto to also go to Ohara, and those who've gone have never been disappointed.

The road in Ohara splits and at one end of the road lies the Buddhist nunnery of Jakko-in ... Recently, I was shocked to read that the nunnery buildings burned to the ground in 1999-however, it was being rebuilt, and was supposed to re-open in 2004. It would be great if someone could go there and report if the nunnery bldgs. have in fact been rebuilt.

Rotenburo's response: my family and I stayed at the Chaya minshuku in Ohara 6/23-26 and used Ohara as our base for seeing Kyoto - we drove, so staying out of the center of Kyoto was do-able. My wife and I walked up to Jakkoin early on Saturday morning, but the gates were closed, as were all the fascinating pottery shops along the way (we looked in the windows, though). The inn-keeper's wife answered your question. According to her, Jakkoin's buildings were all finished and reopened on June 1. I would recommend Ohara to all who are mobile (car or bike) and looking for a place to stay in Kyoto. With eight people, we were glad to stay at a minshuku with two meals for Y6300 a person a day. Ohara has about ten minshuku listed on the internet and it is about a 25 minute drive from the sights in eastern Kyoto.