10-Day Itinerary Tokyo, Kyoto, Onsen Ryokan

Hello all!

My husband and I are planning a trip to Japan in late March/early April and I would greatly appreciate any advice you may have for our itinerary. Tokyo has been on my husband�fs bucket list – which is why we decided to go to Japan! He�fs a big foodie and loves the city while I�fm a little more low key and love being outdoors. Our main bases will be Tokyo and Kyoto. As this is a busy time of year in Japan, I want to go ahead and secure our accommodations and basic itinerary. Then, go into the specifics of our day-to-day during the trip!

• Itinerary below: At this point, we�fre trying to decide how much time we should spend in each city and whether there are any day trips we should take from either Tokyo or Kyoto.
• Possible itinerary change: Someone has already mentioned that they think we should split our time in Tokyo up between the beginning and the end of the trip. Or even go straight to Kyoto once we land in Tokyo. Then work our way back to Tokyo – thoughts?
• Ryokan: I knew I wanted to stay in a ryokan for one night. Once I started doing some research I noticed onsen ryokans are a thing and we would love to stay in one for a night! However, I am having a hard time finding one that would be convenient for us location-wise in getting to/from Tokyo and Kyoto and one that would have a private onsen. Any recommendations?
• Tokyo accommodations: We are thinking we would like to stay in Shinjuku – any specific accommodation recommendations?
• Kyoto accommodations: Open to any and all suggestions!
• JR pass: Since we are not in Japan for very long and will not be travelling to many destinations, would a JR pass be worth it for us?

Day 1, Friday – Arriving in Tokyo around 5 pm
Day 2, Saturday – Tokyo
Day 3, Sunday – Tokyo
Day 4, Monday – Tokyo
Day 5, Tuesday – should we stay in Tokyo for a 4th day? Or take a day trip? Or add this to our time in Kyoto?
Day 6, Wednesday – leave Tokyo early and head to an onsen ryokan for the day/night (still need to find one)
Day 7, Thursday – head to Kyoto early
Day 8, Friday – Kyoto
Day 9, Saturday – Kyoto
Day 10, Sunday – Leave Kyoto for Tokyo – flight departs Tokyo around 3 pm

Again, any advice y�fall could give would be greatly appreciated! Thanks!

Hi Kimberly,

Since no one else responded to you and I feel bad seeing a post with no responses I will do my best to help you.

The closest onsen along the most direct route between Tokyo and Kyoto are probably: Hakone (quite popular with foreigners), Atami (not the most attractive onsen town, but very well known), The Izu Pennisula, or you could go a little past Kyoto and try Arima onsen in Kobe. Of those, I've only personally been to Hakone. Hakone is convenient and tends to do well with foreigners. The Hakone area is ~15-45 minutes or so from Odawara Station on the shinkansen line depending on where you pick to stay. I would not necessarily recommend any of the places I've stayed so someone else will need to recommend places. I know places in Hakone do have private onsen, some fancier places even have private onsen attached to rooms.

In terms of how you split up your time it really depends on your interests and what you want to do. I know people who have just done trips to Tokyo and environs and I know people who have done trips to just Kansai. You really only have 8 full days in Japan. You don't say which airport you are using, but if it's Narita, it's a good 45 minutes to 1 hour (or more) from what most people think of Tokyo, so you really don't have either the day of arrival or departure to get a lot done. If you are flying from NRT, depending on how long your flight to your home would be, I would not recommend having a 3-4 hour train trip ahead of said flight. I would stay in Tokyo the night before.

Other than staying in a ryokan for 1 night, preferably with private onsen what do you want to do?? What are your interests? Be honest with yourselves. If you're going to Japan you should do things based on your interests and expectations and not what me or some other random person on the internet tells you to do. You could easily spend your entire trip in the Tokyo area and just get a JR East or JR Nagano-Niigata Pass and have an awesome time. Maybe going to Kyoto is a priority to you. But you need to figure that out for yourselves.

I have several times gone directly to Kyoto/Osaka upon landing in Tokyo. Where I live, there are no direct flights to KIX and I wanted to start in Kyoto/Osaka. I have a very long flight from my home (about 14.5 hours and a huge time change) I generally pick the train over flying from NRT to Itami or KIX because it really only saves me about 1 hour and I prefer being able to stop and get something better than plane food on the trip to Kansai. I also like having more legroom on the train. However, with low cost airfares, it might be cheaper for you to fly. Last trip we didn't arrive in our hotel in Osaka until 22:00 and we landed in Narita around 16:00. We did takyuubin some bags, wait in line to turn in our passes, and eat some dinner before even taking the train from Tokyo to Shin-Osaka, and this includes our transport from Shin-Osaka to our hotel in Osaka. I was tired but OK with it, my then 7 year old was pretty miserable and had a hard time getting up to get off the shinkansen.

But again what do you want to do in Kyoto or Kansai? Are you just going there because it feels expected of you or are there things you want to do?

It's hard to recommend specific hotels without having some idea of budget. I've stayed at 4 different hotels in the last 3 years in Kyoto. It feels like Kyoto and Tokyo are constantly adding new hotels. I personally do not like staying or spending a lot of time in Shinjuku. I also am a mother traveling with a grade schooler so I don't do night life.

Late March/early April is a vacation time for Japanese schools and possibly sakura time. Hotels will cost more and transport might be more crowded.

Good luck!