Alpine Route Itinerary

Would appreciate your advise on the following :-
Day 1 - arriving at Nagoya (名古屋) @ 9:05am
Pick up rental car, proceed to Takayama (高山) via Gifu (岐阜), drive time 2 hrs 40mins, expected to arrive at Takayama by 5:00pm (including lunch break), after check-in, explore the old town, rest for the night

Day 2 – Rise early, after check-out, go to Tateyama Station by 7am for our Tateyama Kurobe Alpine Route (立山黒部) journey. Park our car at the Station overnight, (Free parking lots available). Forward our luggage to hotel and stay the night at Hotel Tateyama at 2,450m above sea level

Day 3 – Continue to explore Alpine Route after breakfast. We will make our descend back to Toyama (富山県) before lunch. Pick up rental car at the Tateyama Station and continue our journey to Takayama, explore old town, savour Hida beef (www.ajikura.jp).

Day 4 – After breakfast, explore morning market, then make day trip to Hida No Sato (飛騨の里) , Shirakawago (白川郷), visit Tojinbo Cliff (東尋坊).

Day 5 – After check-out, do a day trip to Gokayama (五箇山) and Kanazawa (金沢), thereafter, make our way back to Nagoya. Drive time is 3.5 hrs, along the way we will pass by Fukui (福井) and Nagahama (长滨), can stop by at Lake Biwa (琵琶湖) before returning rental car at Nagoya Station.

Day 6 – Shopping and eating in Nagoya, can take train to visit Toyota Museum if interested

Day 7 – More shopping time in Nagoya

Day 8 – Check-out early at 7am and go to airport to catch our flight at 10:30am

Hi!

I admit I am a little confused by various aspects of your itinerary.

First, I am not sure when you are doing the route, but please be aware the website for the route recommends Nagano in if you plan to go in November and the route is closed December-the middle of April.

Second, so are you paying for two one way option tickets or only going as far as Murodo and then going back? or are you going down onto the Nagano side then going from Nagano to Toyama via shinkansen and then taking the train to Tateyama Station? The reason I ask is the option ticket is one way and doesn't allow back tracking. I think if you are trying to do from Murodo to Ogizawa to Tateyama station you will have a hard time getting there by noon.

If you are staying in the same location in Takayama on night 1 and night 3, you might want to see if they are willing to hold your luggage for you since I am unsure if your luggage would actually arrive at the Tateyama Hotel while you are still there.

Third: Why are you going to Tojinbo on your Shirakawa Go day. It would make sense to go when you visit Kanazawa since it's between Kanazawa and Fukui. It makes more sense to combine Hida no Sato, Shirakawa Go and Gokayama.

Fourth, I am not sure where this 3.5 hours is coming from. It's about an hour from Takayama to Gokayama and another hour from there to Kanazawa. And then you get the 3.5 hours of driving so it's actually over 5.5 hours of driving with no stops. I think you are underestimating stop over times and that also doesn't include for any traffic. food stops and gas stops.

It might make sense to stay on day 4 somewhere closer to Kanazawa rather than going back to Takayama.

I think your trip seems exhausting and has a lot of long days and super early morning starts (like leaving Takayama at 5:00 am for Tateyama. But I am not a morning person.

Good luck!

Agree with everything @rkold was saying.

Just one addition. On your first Takayama day you are exploring the city after 17:00. Consider that in Japan even in summer it gets dark quite early. You have another day for Takayama so that not be a concern for you, but just so you know.

Enjoy your trip to Japan.

Thanks rkold and LikeBike for your comments. It sure shade lights to my planning.
We have 4 adults, travelling to Nagoya from 15-22 April 2020. We think that self drive would be more flexible and economy of scale in terms of transportation cost. The headache comes when we are not sure how to settle our rental car and luggage while going to Alpine Route. As Mid April coincides with the opening of Snow Wall and close to Golden Week, we envisage the human traffic in Alpine Route will be massive, that's why we intend to spread it over 2 days by staying 1 night in Hotel Tateyama.
Please advise if we should :
1) return our rental car at Toyama or Tateyama Station (which will incur additional cost as it's different prefecture) and take the various mode of transportation and get down from Ogizawa side
2) park rental car at Tateyama Station and lock our big luggage in the car, bringing only carry-on luggage, do a two-way return trip and descend down back to Tateyama Station, pick up car and head back to Nagoya
3) if option (1), should we arrange for luggage to be forwarded to our next hotel ?
Thanks in advance