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The original was posted on /r/japantravel by /u/rconti on 2024-12-15 06:09:43+00:00.
First off, I’m very verbose so I’m going to try really hard to make this brief and not detail everything we did each day; feel free to ask questions. I’ve never been particularly active on Reddit, but I got some good info from reading here, so I’m trying to give back a bit.
Background:
My partner and I try to travel at least once or twice a year, so we’ve got a reasonable bit of experience with international travel. Her job makes it hard to get contiguous blocks of time off, so when she gets the time, we find a place, and we go. We had second thoughts about going to a northern hemisphere destination so late in the year, after a sub-freezing trip to Europe a few years back, but we pulled the trigger on Japan and honestly can’t imagine a better time of year to go. The fall colors were absolutely off the hook gorgeous everywhere we went. Skies were crystal blue most days, with only a spot of sprinkles on a day or two. Hearing humidity tales from others, seeing air conditioners placed in implausible locations (like, firing air towards a cable car waiting line), made me think it must be insufferable at times during the summer.
Japan has been on our list for a long time, but we didn’t specifically have anything we wanted to see there. I had never been to Asia before, period, and I had some anxiety about finding my way around a country where I not only didn’t know the language, but not even the character set. The way we travel is to look at a place, try to plan out a rough # of days in each area based on perceived number of things to do there, have ideas about what we want to do, and then sorta YOLO it from there. Meals, attractions, etc, we all figure out once we’re there. We try to plan hotels beforehand (since we already have the rough dates), but in this case we didn’t book our last couple of cities until we were in Japan.
Dates:
Wednesday November 27 - Friday December 13
Flight:
Our home airport is SFO. We looked at a few options (ZipAir, Hawaiian) before settling on JAL Premium Economy. They do roundtrips from SFO to both NRT and HND at almost the exact same time of day and same price, so we did SFO-HND on a 787. On the way there we hit the clearing price for a cash upgrade to business (with a “very weak” offer, lol). On the way home I didn’t bother offering for an upgrade so we took our 2x config PE seats on the side of the plane.
Side note, any flight with 2x is so sweet if you’re traveling with a partner. For this reason, even economy in a A350 is pretty awesome because the 2x config on the sides-- my last int’l trip (Ireland in July) was solo with a window seat on an A350 and I lucked out with an empty seat next to me.
Flying time SFO-HND was 11h05 on the way there and 8h06 on the way home; pretty painless with no issues at all. Excellent meals and service both ways. British Airways on the way there due to being in biz, and JAL Sakura on the way home from HND; available to biz, PE, and even economy but only for economy flexible fares.
Another side note, traveling around thanksgiving is so sweet when you’re leaving the country. Security line at SFO was literally 1 minute for both pre-check and non-pre. We traveled on the same day last year (to NZ) and it was the same painless process.
Transit:
Didn’t bother with a JR pass since it sounds like a bad deal these days.
Took mostly subway, light rail, buses, commuter rail. Bought mobile Suica cards on our iPhones on the way over, and topped up the same way as we went. Shinkansen between cities. 2 brief car rentals of 6h each for different reasons. Didn’t bother with the smart-ex app for Shinkansen because it sounds like a dumpster fire of unhappiness and regret. Just bought Shinkansen tickets from a computer (twice), and 15-minutes-before in person, once, when the computer required a physical IC card and seemed unable to deal with people who didn’t have one (Hiroshima).
Tokyo, 3 nights:
We stayed at the Royal Park Hotel Iconic Tokyo Shiodome (I think that’s all the words) on the way in. It seemed reasonable to go with an ‘easier’ (read: western, more expensive) place to deal with on the way in due to a 17:00 arrival and not wanting to find something far from transit, or an AirBnB with a weird checkin process. Hotel was great, no notes. Right above the Shinbashi station, great location for transit although not a ton going on in the area.
Things we did: Futako Tamagawa (FTG) Parkrun, Meji Jingu temple, a cat cafe, Hamarikyū Gardens, Carrot Tower, Gōtokuji Temple (cat temple), Shibuya Crossing.
Hiroshima, 2 nights:
Grabbed a pair of green car seats for the Nozomi Shinkansen from Tokyo to Hiroshima. 4 or 4.5h, painless. Had bento boxes and various food and beer items we bought beforehand.
Stayed at the Hilton Hiroshima for something like $105US per night. Absolutely insane. Simply stunning hotel for an absurd price. One of the nicest places I’ve ever stayed. Looked brand-new. Got executive lounge access by virtue of being a diamond club member even though I’ve not stayed a Hilton in years-- just have diamond club through a work affiliation.
Things we did: Peace Memorial, museum, A-bomb dome. Okonomiyaki dinner at Hassei (highly, highly recommended). Whisky at Bar Little Happiness (ditto). Hiroshima Castle. Mazda museum (not recommended unless you’re very specifically a Mazda fan and interested in seeing the museum cars).
Miyajima Island, 1 night:
Took the ferry from Hiroshima Peace Park to Miyajima island. The longer (45min) ferry seemed more convenient coming from our hotel, but on the way out (Miyajima to Kyoto) we elected to take the ferry to Miyajimaguchi and catch the JR Sanyo train to Hiroshima where we picked up the Shinkansen.
Miyajima island was on our list, but we hadn’t planned on overnighting here until a friend pushed us to do so. We’ve had plenty of trips where we only spend a night or two in each location, and I was trying to avoid just doing 1 night stays but I’m so glad we made an exception here. Our friend was planning on staying at a different ryoken, but it was booked by the time we looked, so we chose Iwaso. Neither one was cheap, but staying at a ryoken was on my list, and this was the perfect place for it. Maybe sleeping on a futon on the floor is not the most comfortable thing in the world, but the experience was just spectacular. They took our luggage from the ferry, and we spent the day exploring the island.
We walked around the shops and the waterfront, explored the Itsukushima shrine, took a bunch of photos of the floating torii gate, and made our way up to the Daishi-in temple. This was out first hint of how truly special this place would be. The temple was absolutely stunning. The views from below, with maple tree colors everywhere, was truly a sight to behold, and it only got better as we hiked up and explored the grounds for an hour or so. From there, starting around 2pm, we hiked all the way up to the summit of Mount Misen, which took at least the full 2 hours advertised. There were so many place to stop and take photos, and shrines to see along the way. Hiking down to the ropeway took longer than expected, and we ended up having to run the last 1/8mi to catch the final 4:30pm ropeway car off the hill. I have no idea how they handle the inevitable people who miss the ropeway. Even knowing the distances involved, it all took a lot longer than we thought, and with dark and cold incoming, the hike down would have been extremely unpleasant and slow.
We really loved the ryoken experience; enjoyed the clothes, the baths, and the meals. Super relaxing and enjoyable. Dinner must have been 10 courses. Even breakfast was a production. In the morning, we checked out, did some more touristing, and hiked back where we had ourselves and our bags shuttled to the terminal.
Overall, Miyajima Island is one of the most spectacular places I’ve been, and I wouldn’t even consider skipping it. If you’re in the area, you absolutely need to see Daishi-in temple and experience the Mt Misen hike. The crowds in town and around the floating gate are, well, crowded, but it’s easy enough to get away from.
Kyoto, 4 nights:
Took the ferry from Miyajima to Miyajimaguchi, short walk to the train station, JR Sanyo line to Hiroshima, Shinakensen to Kyoto. This was our first minor travel hiccup as the Shinkansen ticket machines here were unable to comprehend a person without a physical IC card. I think this is a difference between JR West and JR East. Stood in line, worked with a ticket agent who couldn’t get us tickets on the next train because it was in about 10mins, so we caught one another 30mins later with assigned seats but sitting next to a random person due to the lateness of the ticket purchase. No big deal, just slightly confusing.
Kyoto was unquestionably the lowlight of the trip, and for the exact reasons we’d been warned of. Even on weekdays in December, it’s crowded. I can’t fathom coming here during peak tourist season. Even just walking the sidewalks of town, it’s chock-a-block with people from storefront to wrought iron sidewalk railing. We’re not into instagram foodie culture or any of that shit, so thankfully we didn’t wait in any lines or anything, but, yeah, it’s crowded.
That said, it was a really nice place to visit. We won’t be back next time we visit because we saw what we needed to…
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