Home
Back

Dear visitor, if you know the answer to this question, please post it. Thank you!

Note that this thread has not been updated in a long time, and its content might not be up-to-date anymore.

My 17-day itinerary for Japan 2013/2/27 08:09
Hey all,

Just wanted a sanity check by those who would know better than I, a first-time traveler to Japan. This is what Ifve got at the moment.

Leave the US on March 28th, midday (EST).

Day 1 - Arrive in Japan on March 29th at 3:25 PM, Japan time. Make my way to my hostel in Ikebukuro, get settled in, maybe walk around and have some food, stay active until bedtime to stave off the jet lag.

Days 2 & 3 (March 30 & 31) - Tokyo sightseeing, based out of Ikebukuro. I have some rough plans for this (Tokyo Sky Tree, a shrine in Akasaka, maybe Tokyo Tower, cherry blossoms, Akihabara, Harajuku on Sunday morning) but nothing super-concrete yet. Still researching on this site (which is a GODSEND).

Days 4 & 5 (April 1 & 2) - Going down to Yokohama to stay with a friend, sightseeing around Yokohama (potentially taking the train back up to Tokyo on the 1st if therefs still stuff I want to do there that I didnft get a chance to do).

Days 6 | 8 (April 3, 4, 5) - Taking the shinkansen to Kyoto, sightseeing for three days. Definitely want to see the Fushimi Inari shrine, the Kinkaku-ji, and lots of other stuff (again, still filling in my gsightseeingh list from here).

Day 9 (April 6) - Taking a day trip to Yoshinoyama for the cherry blossoms, assuming theyfre still in heavy bloom. Taking the train to Osaka that evening.

Day 10 | 11 (April 7, 8) - Osaka! Okonomiyaki! Takoyaki! Jaywalking! Still filling in my sightseeing list here as well.

Day 12 - (April 9) - Overnight trip to Koyasan (already booked a ryokan room). Really excited about this!

Day 13 - (April 10) Day trip to Nishinomiya, because Ifm a big fan of The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya. Will spend a couple hours walking around town taking pictures, eating lunch, then get on the train (to Shin-Kobe, then get on the shinkansen) to Hiroshima.

Day 14 - (April 11) - Hiroshima! Peace Park, A-Bomb Domec lots of sobering stuff, probably.

Day 15 - (April 12) - Overnight trip to Miyajima Island (again, booked a room already). Really looking forward to visiting the famous Itsukushima Shrine, taking lots of pictures, walking around and just generally enjoying the scenery.

Day 16 - (April 13) - Travel back to the Tokyo area via shinkansen, do some shopping for selvedge denim jeans, CDs, and souvenirs in the afternoon, then take the train to Narita for an overnight stay near the airport.

Day 17 - (April 14) - Fly back to the USA out of Narita.

Does this all seem reasonable to you guys? I do have a couple questions relating to this plan:

1) Do you think itfd be worth using a takuhaibin service so I have less to carry during my day 9, 12 and 15 side-trips? Ifm only planning on carrying a backpack and a 21h gcarry-onh-style rolling suitcase, but I still feel like itfd be a pain to carry the suitcase on those days. If I could send the suitcase on to Osaka, Hiroshima, and Narita so I had less to burden me, would it be worth it?

2) Related to number 1, do you think Ifll manage to successfully navigate a takuhaibin service (and, generally, Japan) as an EXTREMELY limited speaker of Japanese whofs traveling alone? I have a rudimentary knowledge of simple sentence structure, a few conversational bits (greetings, introduction, please, thank you), and can look up phrases and say them okay, butc itfs very limited. Any tips for me re: the language thing? Ifm worried Ifm going to do a lot of gEigo ga wakarimasu ka?h and then getting an gIie, wakarimasenh and feeling helpless.

Any thoughts/input would be appreciated.
by killmoms  

Re: My 17-day itinerary for Japan 2013/2/28 03:15
Takyubin sounds like a good idea. usually you can send luggage from hotel to hotel, but for a hostel I would contact it and ask them if they do it. Bring a print-out of all of your accomodations' names and addresses in Japanese, along with a map from the hotel's website. It will help with the takyubin forms as well as help you if you get lost or hop in a taxi.
by ChicagoMike rate this post as useful

Re: My 17-day itinerary for Japan 2013/2/28 05:08
Yeah, Ifm planning on taking a LOT of gofflineh data with me. I am also getting a micro SIM card rental so Ifll have unlimited data on my iPhone at least, so Ifll be saving lots of addresses of both hotel and sightseeing locations in Google Maps. It seems their public transit data is pretty decent for a lot of the major cities too. And thatfll give me access to stuff like Hyperdia too, if I need some more detailed train info.
by killmoms rate this post as useful

Jet lag 2013/2/28 08:53
"Day 1 - Arrive in Japan on March 29th at 3:25 PM, Japan time. Make my way to my hostel in Ikebukuro, get settled in, maybe walk around and have some food, stay active until bedtime to stave off the jet lag."

Exactly the thing to do. Stay up as late as you can, but you will still wake up very early, 4 or 5 AM. The 2nd day will be better and you should be nearly back to normal by the 3rd day.

Go to the Tobu Dept. store. there are dozens of restaurants on the 9th through 13th or 14th floors. 11th & 12th used to be best.
by Dick H rate this post as useful

Re: My 17-day itinerary for Japan 2013/3/1 13:30
Thanks for the feedback Dan! I was toying with an idea, maybe you can tell me if it would do more harm than good.

I was thinking about staying up all night the night before my 12 noon flight to Japan, making sure I don't fall asleep or "take a nap" or "rest my eyes" at all, which I thought might make it easier to sleep a bit on the flight, and then kind of shock my body into a different schedule once I land in the mid-afternoon in Japan. Or do you think that'd be inadvisable?

I've never gone this direction w/ international travel before. My only other trip outside of the States was to Europe when I was 16. Going that way we left here at 5 PM, tried to grab a little nap on the plane, and then arrived in Germany at 7 AM and our teacher kept us up and moving the whole day to combat jet-lag. It worked pretty well too, but I didn't try to hijack my sleep schedule before leaving.
by killmoms rate this post as useful

Re: My 17-day itinerary for Japan 2013/3/1 13:31
Sorry, Dick! Not Dan. Clearly my brain is already in a great state to begin with. It'll be a wonder if I can remember my own name when I arrive in Japan.
by killmoms rate this post as useful

Re: My 17-day itinerary for Japan 2013/3/2 01:02
That does not sound like a good idea. You might not be able to sleep on the flight regardless. A better bet is to take a pill after the first meal and they turn off the lights. I don't want to cross any ethical boundaries, but typical American OTC meds would be benadryl or dramamine.

Almost always though, I am usually dead tired by the time I get out of the airport. Byt the time you get to your hotel it will be at least 5 or 6 pm. Go for a walk, eat dinner, etc. If you don't sleep by 9pm you should be fine. If you think about it 9pm Tokyo would be 5 am new York time (not sure where you are from), so I think if you had slept 3-5 hours on the flight it should work out well.
by ChicagoMike rate this post as useful

Jet Lag 2013/3/2 12:51
I've done the trip dozens of times and I've never been able to sleep at all. Especially on your first trip you will be excited and with the plane noise I doubt you will sleep at all.
by Dick H rate this post as useful

Re: My 17-day itinerary for Japan 2013/3/3 16:10
Fair enough. Then "a good night's sleep the night before" it is!
by killmoms rate this post as useful

reply to this thread