Itinerary help 15 nights first timers

The restaurant at Kobe is Steakland :)

Hope you enjoy your trip!

As it gets closer to our trip, the more I feel like we are taking off Hakone from our list; even Nikko. As hakata14 mentioned Hakone does take a whole day and so is Nikko as what I see on travel blogs. There are so much to explore around Tokyo and few days are just not going to be enough; considering Disneysea will also take another whole day.

By the way, how does everyone feel about Odaiba? Is it a must-go place in your opinion? It seems like just a huge shopping centre with that liberty statue only, right?

What are your must eat in Tokyo? So far, we only have one place we must make time to go to: Unagi Hashimoto. For the rest, we think we'll just get anything with long lines wherever we will be at that time.

"Must eat in Tokyo".
Well, it depends on your travel budget, but if you don't mind spending 40 - 50,000 Yen on one dinner (in 2), then Kyubey is the place to go. Probably the best sushi place in the world.

Odaiba, I think the only part that is nice to sea for Odaiba is to walk over rainbow bridge, ideally from Odaiba back to Tokyo. You get a nice skyline. The rest of Odaiba, unless you are interested in some of the museums over there is not interesting in my eyes.

Enjoy your trip to Japan!

Odaiba is good for the night views of Rainbow Bridge and the skyline of Tokyo. But it is not really a must go place. You can also do nighttime views of the city at a few observatory around the city. Both free and paid like Tokyo SkyTree(Paid) or like Tokyo Metropolitan Government Office (Free).

Yes if you feel like it, drop some stuff out. Also while in Japan, you can be flexible as well and also drop/swap things out when you need. There is always next time :)

Hope you have a nice trip!

For me Odaiba is a place you travel to around 3-4pm. Do some shopping and have dinner. Wait for it to go dark and view the Rainbow Bridge. Waiting until 7pm and peak hour/s travel to subside and then travel home.

I wouldn't assign a whole day to it. Just a evening.

May I ask will we pass Odaiba on the way to Disney Resort from (say) Tokyo?

Missed out on The Miracosta Hotel at Disneysea =( Should have done my research on that months ago and made a booking 6 months prior, it's all fully booked now. Probably have to settle with Disneyland Hotel instead or Ambassador (for the breakfast with Chef Mickey).

I just realised apart from Disneysea and Doraemon museum, our Tokyo itinerary is pretty much flexible. If we get a very nice day for Mt Fuji viewing from Tokyo that would be wonderful, if not then we just have to come back =D

I don't really remember seeing all that much on the train between Tokyo Station and Tokyo Disney. I don't remember seeing Odaiba. I usually go to Odaiba for events at Big Sight... but that's neither here nor there. My daughter has not yet been, next Summer will be trip #3.

I've heard mixed reviews of MiraCosta from the DisBoard people who stayed there. Several preferred the Tokyo Disneyland Hotel. I did find the extra 15 minutes of early entry were much more useful than I ever could have anticipated and I was glad I could buy a 2 day park hopper.

I stayed at Tokyo Disneyland Hotel. Compared to other luxury hotels I found the hotel itself disappointing. It was not as nice as either the Disneyland Hotel, the Grand Floridian, or some of the Tokyo luxury hotels, though the room was enormous. I loved the location.

If you have your heart set on MiraCosta, try a website like Japanican as well. Sometimes booking sites have additional inventory on hold. I'd also be concerned that perhaps the parks will be crowded. :/

Just checked google map for JR Keiyo Line and yeah that's fairly far from Odaiba, so most likely won't be able to see it.

I had only aware of the Happy15 advantage of staying at Disney Resort hotels couple days ago and thought that would be a major benefit. We hope to get a room at MiraCosta because we are going to Disneysea only and staying within the park itself seems like best idea. Unfortunately, everywhere is sold out - even on Japanican. I still check on the online reservation page multiple times a day, just in case someone would cancel =p

Surely Disneyland Hotel itself won't be too bad, right? Did you get to see much of the parks from your hotel room window?

Oh, forgot to mention we checked the crowd forcast from this web:
http://www15.plala.or.jp/gcap/disney/
and it looks alright for the day we wanted to go (Wed, 6 Dec); fingers crossed it will be as predicted =)

I see you will be in ryokan in Takayama, this is great!
If you go to Hakone, stay a night there in ryokan with onsen - take all the pampering from kaiseki dinner to outdoor onsen, it is heaven!
*have been in J for 5 times, and onsen stay is always in top of our bests.

Yep, definitely will stay one night in a Hakone's ryokan in our next Japan trip =) The more I research for our trip, more places I want to go but cannot have the time for, hence there will be the next trip for them. Does it feel awkward the first time trying out public onsen? We book one with private onsen and the other with option to book your private onsen, just to be safe =p But, yeah veyr much look forward to that experience.

Does it feel awkward the first time trying out public onsen?

No, it is a wonderful experience (unless you have problems with nakedness). Nobody is staring:)
For me private onsen is like home bath. In public one there is much more space, big nicely done outdoor pools with stones, trees. If lucky you can enjoy rain, snow or Fuji view from bath.

Thanks girlwithpearl, guess it just something you should try out when in Japan, right? Will brave myself and check out the public onsen in the ryokan we are staying =D

Onsen is definitely one of the highlights of any travel to Japan, if you like hot water (some are very hot), if you don't have tattoos (or can hide them) and if you don't have a problem being naked.
Most public onsen are gender separated. In more remote areas there are also mixed ones. Probably for a starter I would go for separated ones.
If you feel very awkward you can kind of cover yourself in a towel while walking around, but never in the water. The towel then belongs on your head or just anywhere else outside of the pool. You will however stick out if you walk around completely wrapped in a towel.

I don't know about the men's section but specially elderly ladies are also very happy to chat with you. So overall it's a very friendly atmosphere.

Enjoy onsening in Japan!

Yes, my friend has warned me about towel wrapping in onsen, she said it will draw more attention than otherwise. I guess, we'll see how my onsen experience going to be hehehe. Most people I talked to have ended up really enjoying onsen and looked forward to do that again =)

Big thanks to everyone for your inputs/advises for our Japan trip. We came back and already miss it, gotta save up for another Japan trip.
We saw Mount Fuji on the shinkansen from Nagano to Tokyo, was a clear day and Mount Fuji was not shy! And again, one last glimpse of Mount Fuji from our flight back.
Now looking back at my original itinerary, I can see how you all must have thought we are nuts to squeeze in so many things in a day in Kyoto. We ended up take many off the list and decided to enjoy each place we visited.
We also tried onsen at Takayama, and yes the public (gender separated) one is great, better than reserved ones. The outdoor one is even better. Absolutely love the ryokan stay with the kaiseki meal =D
Universal Studio and Disneysea totally took us one whole day! And even that, still we could not manage to get all the rides. But Fantasmic show at Disneysea was amazing, I would love to watch it again and again.
The next time we go to Japan, I think we'll spend least time at Tokyo - probably just for doing day trips to Nikko or Hakone only and Disneysea only =)

good you enjoyed the trip!
I agree, it is better to see less, but more deeply, spend more time and not rush from place to place. Our first trip was Tokio-Hakone-Kyoto, loved it so much that now 10 years later had already trip no 6...
We always keep a week in Kyoto in schedule, and vary the rest. 2 nights in onsen-ryokan is a must for us too.