Self drive?

I have worked out the following itinerary for self drive.
3N Tokyo (day trips to Nikko and Hakone); 1N each for the following kawaguchiko, Matsumoto, Tsumago, Takayama, Shirawago, Kanazawa, Hikone, Nara, Koyasan, Kobe, Himeji, Okayama, Hiroshima, Miyajima, ending in Fukuoka for a few N (return rental car here also) and fly home from there. Total 25N. Pl advise if any town is not feasible to drive into. We may return our car in Osaka, visit there and take train out to HImeji and Miyajima and then to Fukuoka. Fly back home from here. Really appreciate advise. Any accomodation to recc ?

You could drive it all. I don't see the point though when you are going to highly used tourist areas, (that you exampled) with good frequent public transport.

Most hotels will charge you 1000-2000 yen per night to garage your car. And then the is the highway tolls that can add up to huge amounts also for the distances you wanna achieve.

So you need to deiced on the total costs of hiring a car, tolls, garaging costs, extra depot return fee etc versus paying for buses and trains.

At least you can come and go when and where you like to (no timetables to follow).
AND you can and will go to places off the beaten tourist tracks, seeing more of the real Japan.
Is your Japan Trip cheaper by car? Not sure...but using a JR pass aint for free either ;-)
Yes, drive yourself.

TBH, I have checked your day to day travel, it's virtually throughout Japan, you can do it, but you will be dead with all the travel. I suppose you will be sharing the driving with someone else. The cost involve will sum up, rental cost, toll charge, although most hotel offer free parking, those that don't require 1000-2000 yen a day parking, petrol different location drop off, a hybrid card is recommended. And my personal opinon is using a JR pass for all the travel instead of driving, or you can drive in certain area, as it's much flexible. this is a itinerary that I will not consider.

I would use public transport as well.

Just did a quick quotation

Pickup at Tokyo station, drop off at Fukuoka Airport for 25 nights with nissan rentals: Epower note for 2 person with full coverage.

Basic Car rental Fee 121,500
One-Way Drop-off Fee 69,000
Collision Damage Waiver Fee 18,000
NOC Support Plan 4,500
Nissan Safety Support Plan ("NAS") 7,500


Subtotal 220,500
Consumption Tax 17,640

Total 238,140

Just a example of the cost, which does not include petrol and toll fee.

1) check out the one-way drop off fee from Tokyo to Fukuoka...it will be horrendous

2) car hire is great for seeing the smaller places, but really imho the most convenient and quickest way is to travel inter-city by train and then hire cars for a few days to do loop trips to smaller places, returning them to where you picked them up, or to another place in the same prefecture.

Thkq all for your advise. I know its costly but we like driving holiday and this is an indulgent.
I was told its cheaper to rent a car from Tokyo hotel instead of online. Any opinion?

If cost is not important, do it online or pop into a rental service station, nissan or toyota are the main one's, and will probably cheaper, but booking online gives you more choice of cars, a walking in will have less choice.

I agree, driving in Japan is relaxing, but you are spending too much time driving, and it does get very tiring, and in most cases you have to drive in the middle of the night if you are to visit some of the places, last time I went from kusatsu to izu, had to leave the hotel in Kusatsu about 3am.

Understand that lots of people love driving, but maybe do some (Google, ViaMichelin, etc) research about how long you will spend driving if you plan to do that route.
Japan is a lovely country- but you have to get out of your car to experience it.

I really appreciate all your counsel. Will take note. May do some sector on public transport. Thkq once again. We normally dont book hotels ahead when we travel. But with Japan we have to book every destination hotel as there is language problem Fortunately hotel online allow free cancellation/ changes closer to date -real advantage.

I enjoy self drive during trips too, however, given the huge region that you will be travelling across, it certainly make sense to split up to self drive only around selected regions and travelling by train between some cities.

Travelling by car between cities may take longer. And there may not be too much view to enjoy on the larger highways due to sound barriers and tunnels etc (at least that was how I felt during recent self drive trip. Not sure if it might be because I was the sole driver and also had to concentrate on the road.)

I did not notice the period of travel mentioned, so there could also be heavy traffic to consider during peak seasons.

A balance of car and train at the right places could enable you to enjoy the best of both and the most enjoyable trip.

My initial reaction was to suggest you drop the car off at Osaka and use the train for the Kobe-Okayama-Hiroshima-Fukuoka leg.

But although the Osaka-Hiroshima leg would basically be driving from city to city on the motorway, with little to see in between, making the train really much faster and more convenient, a really fantastic route (time permitting) would be to put the car on the ferry at Hiroshima to Matsuyama in Shikoku (allowing you to check out the castle and Dogo onsen), drive to the small port town of Misaki in the far west of Shikoku and again ferry over to Oita, from where you can do the stunning drive across to Kumamoto castle, taking places such as Usuki, Mt Aso, Yufuin, etc along the way, and then grab the motorway up to Fukuoka...

I would recommend you use the train for your day trip to Nikko - it takes a couple of hours on the bullet train and will take you at least 3 hours by car, even using the motorway (that's six hours driving there and back).

For the rest, I would do it in this order:
Tokyo-Hakone-Kawaguchiko-Matsumoto-Takayama-Shirakawago-Kanazawa-Hikone-Nara-Koya-Osaka/Kobe.

(Btw, if you are lucky with the weather and getting good views, there are some seriously gorgeous drives around the Hakone-Kawaguchiko area, such as the Izu Skyline, the Ashinoko Skyline and Mazda Skyline. Similarly, when in Shirakawago, be sure to check out the other villages such as Gokayama - this is when having a car really comes into it own, and you should take full advantage of it...).

In 2015 and 2016, I did a 46,000 km driving trip round Japan in my campervan. You might find some useful info in my blog (I'm afraid you'll have to scroll through to find the relevant parts of Japan for you)
https://myjapantravels.wordpress.com/

However, be warned that driving in Japan can be painfully slow once you get off the motorway. Do NOT take google maps driving time estimates as being anywhere near accurate!! You need to add on at least another 50% to whatever time they give...as an example this weekend I did a day trip to a place 70km away. According to google maps, it should take about 2 hours. In fact, it took well over 3 hours on both legs there and back...

Hello,
We returned from a 26 self drive in Japan. Picked up our rental car (chose Nissan as it has full insur support for all breakdown) from Omiya , Saitomo, drove to Nikko, Mt Fujikawaguichicko, Matsumoto, Takayama, Shiragawa, Kanazawa, Takasa, Kyoto, Nara, Koyasan, Kobe, Himeji, Hiroshima, Miyajima, Fukuoka -return to Singapore.

The 1 way drop off charge is v high. Drove for 26 days, plus all expressway tolls, car park charges, petrol and rental car charges =about USD2700 (all in) = abt USD 104/day. Our car is 1.5 cc Nissan roadwin (spacious, like stn wagon, low fuel consumption; can sit 5 pax).

We (2 of us) thoroughly enjoyed the drive and find the cost can be even cheaper if 5 pax share. v comfortable for 4 pax travel together. We had so much freedom.. stop where we like, no need to follow public transport schedule , no waiting for bus/trains; walking with heavy luggages etc...

We enjoyed our trip thoroughly and would like to go again on a driving holiday in Japan as its a safe country and no stress/fear of scam.

Can you also include toll fees, garaging and fuel costs for the trip also please?

Sorry. Just re-read you post. The $104 per day did include those costings.

Searching different rental companies, I always go back to nissan rental, they are one of the only few that offers full coverage, nothing to pay if something goes wrong. I will be using them on December for my one day drive to the fukushima area.

To the Op's, glad everything went well apart from the hole in your wallet.