Alpine route

Hello,
I'll be visiting the Alpine route on September.
I have questions about staying near the alpine route, access and luggage forwarding.
I would prefer to stay at Nagano (and not Omachi) the night before because there are more accommodation options for my budget, but:
1. I saw there is an express bus from Nagano to Ogizawa. Question is, can you only board at Nagano or also at Shimano-Omachi?
2. I saw luggage forwarding service in Nagano opens only at 9:00, which means the earliest I can arrive at the alpine route is 12:15 (3rd express bus), which I'm afraid will be a bit late and will not allow to make the most out of the trip. Drop off at Omachi starts at 08:00 but again, not a lot of accommodation and not sure if boarding the bus is possible.

Do you have any recommendations how to do this efficiently? Maybe other luggage forwarding options?

Thanks!

Have you thought about starting from Toyama? Are there places to stay there that are within your budget? You can get your luggage forwarded from Toyama to Nagano.

We are starting from tokyo and going through matsumoto, alpine route, kanazawa, osaka, hiroshima and so on...so it makes more sense to start from Nagano side than Toyama. I am planning to finish at Toyama.

I think you are talking about this baggage forwarding service.

http://www.alpen-route.com/en/transport_new/baggage.html

This service guarantees same day delivery, but if you can send the luggage one or two days before you can use Ta-q-bin which is cheaper and more flexible.

http://www.kuronekoyamato.co.jp/en/