Kyushu Dec & Jan, a few practical questions

A few misc. practical questions regarding my upcoming trip to Kyushu this Dec/Jan.


1. Taking Shinkansen Nozomi 43 (16:53 dep) or 47 (17:53 dep) from Nagoya to Hakata on Sun, Dec 23rd, how likely is the train to be full then? That is, should we get tickets for reserved seats in advance, or is it unnecessary and some ~20 min before departure we should be then still able to get them? (Not sure of the human traffic levels that day, Sun, Dec 23rd late afternoon/early evening, from Nagoya/north to Hakata/south.)


2. I am staying at Chisun Grand in Nagasaki, and am driving in (as it works out better to rent the car from Fukuoka, as I have to return it there when flying out of FUK; otherwise I'd have only rented the car when leaving Nagasaki). The directions I got from the hotel staff to parking are: "Please turn left on the corner, then turn left again, you see blue sign named 'PRO PARK GOTUOMACHI."

I tried to find this "PRO PARK GOTUOMACHI" exact location, so that I can get and save the map code for it for GPS, but on Google Maps street view don't see it anywhere in any of the small streets/lanes behind/around the hotel (may be those are outdated, I don't know).

I guess it's unlikely for anyone to know exactly where it is...but if anyone does or can find it, sharing the mapcode of the exact location of this small (says only 10 car) parking lot used by the Chisun Grand Nagasaki would be great, and save me the stress of driving around and looking for it in Nagasaki (esp. in big cities like that, if I have to drive, I always want to be 100% prepared and know exactly where I'm going).


3. On Dec 26, taking Kumamoto Ferry (OceanArrow, http://www.kumamotoferry.co.jp/eng_ferry/index.html) from Shimbara to Kumamoto, likely at 12:05 or otherwise 13:50, how likely is it to be full/sold out? Should I ask at the Unzen hotel where we are staying the night before to call and book it for us? Or is it fine and if we show up at, say, 11:50 or 11:55, we should be still able to get on the 12:05 ferry no problem them?

And is there any food available on board the ferry? (Hopefully it's not too wavy.)


4. Lastly, driving from Beppu to Fukuoka airport on Dec 31st early morning, flying out at 10:20am from the International Terminal, we pretty much have to drop off the car by sometime 8:30-8:45am, due to the slow bus ride from the domestic to international terminal (and car rental companies not providing transportation to the terminal, unlike is done in every other country in the world - really disappointing, but I digress..).

My question is, how likely are we to encounter heavy traffic/delays driving into Fukuoka 7:30-8:30am on Mon, Dec 31 (still a workday, right?) morning?

The total drive time from Beppu should be a bit over 2h with a brief stop to refuel the car, so we plan to leave by some 5:45am that morning from Beppu. Does that seem about right?


Many thanks in advance for any advice here on these four items.

There is a Gotomachi parking lot between Chisun Grand Nagasaki and Toyoko Inn Nagasaki Ekimae (closer to Toyoko Inn). If that is the one you are looking for, its mapcode is 44 270 361.

When we took the car ferry from Kumamoto to Shimabara during the off season of March it was surprisingly quite full. It is indeed better to have your hotel phone ahead to book it for you the day before. We asked our hotel in Kumamoto to do that for us.

I don't think you need to worry about the traffic that early in the morning, especially you don't need to drive into Fukuoka from Beppu to Fukuoka Airport.

Thank you, this is very helpful.

While it's not driving quite into Fukuoka city centre on the way to the airport, the airport is right in the city (unlike most other airports), and the one other time we drove back for a 9pm departure in the early evening (around 5pm-6pm) it was bumper to bumper (but moving) traffic from the moment we were some 30-40km out of the city on the way in, and it looked rather congested on the way out.

I assume you'll take the expressway (or else it takes much longer than 2 hours). The exit from the expressway is not far from the airport and the express way itself most likely won't be congested, so I don't think traffic will be a problem for you.