Starting trip planning for next year, Osaka, Nara, Kyoto, Nagano, Tokyo and Tokyo DL.

[MimitoAlex]

So I know I'm in the middle of writing my second trip report "Girls trip". I will finish this week coming up.

I having been just looking around at airfare ... We are looking a early to mid November. Just DH and I

Osaka - Universal, Aquarium, street food.
Nara - Deer Park
Kyoto - Temples, bamboo forest, romantic train
Nagano - snow monkeys
Tokyo or maybe just Tokyo Disneyland to check out Fantasy Spring... or maybe just into tokyo, or both...


Looking at flights - I'm trying to figure out the best route. I have gotten several options, looking around on line, as well as from other friends and such.

So I have a bunch of thoughts..

1) flying into Haneda spend the night, then take the shinkansen to Osaka using it as a home base for Osaka, Nara, Kyoto - Not sure how far Nagano is from Osaka, I'm thinking 4 nights, then shikansen back to Tokyo - Staying in Shibuya or just going straight to Tokyo Disneyland.

2) which I saw this route on-line, from Orlando to John Wayne in California. spend the night,- then direct flight on ANA, or JAL or whatever other airline that fly's into Osaka - then from there fly into Tokyo and leave out of Haneda flying directly home.

So that would mean, 3 flights - this route mean a extra day of travel time. so so ?
Orlando to John Wayne or LAX - we have a friend moving out there, so we could see him.
John Wayne to Osaka
Haneda to Orlando

3) Flying in and out of Tokyo - booking hotel for the whole trip as home, base complete trip. Then just using a small roll on and back pack and book the Nazomi to Osaka, and spend 1 or 2 night there. Skipping Nagano and the snow monkeys not sure it will be cold enough for them, Anyone any thought on Early to mid November?

Please I would love to hear your suggestions or thoughts..

As always Thanks in advance...

 

[gelatoni fan]

1. Nagano is closer to Tokyo than Osaka. If you're starting in Osaka, then you may want to spend a few days there and then use the JR Hokuriku arch pass to visit Nagano and then use that pass to continue on to Tokyo. Otherwise, you should probably have it so that your round trip plane ticket from the US has stops in Tokyo and Osaka and take a round trip shinkansen from Tokyo to Nagano.

2. John Wayne does not have direct flights to Japan although it may be reasonably cheap to book a flight out of there that includes a layover in San Francisco. It looks like you may be looking at a flight that has an overnight layover with an airport change? So your layover will have you fly in to SNA and then out of LAX?

3. If you have nothing you want to do in Nagano other than see the monkeys, it may not be worth the trouble of going out there. January and February are probably the best months and there's a chance you'll be disappointed if you arrive in November and the monkeys are nowhere to be seen or just far away in the mountain rather than near the hot spring. Most likely, an international flight which involves several days in Osaka and several days in Tokyo with a flight between the two will be cheaper than flying in to Tokyo and then doing round trip shinkansen tickets to Osaka. You may need to fiddle around with the dates to get the best price.

 

[MimitoAlex]

1. Nagano is closer to Tokyo than Osaka. If you're starting in Osaka, then you may want to spend a few days there and then use the JR Hokuriku arch pass to visit Nagano and then use that pass to continue on to Tokyo. Otherwise, you should probably have it so that your round trip plane ticket from the US has stops in Tokyo and Osaka and take a round trip shinkansen from Tokyo to Nagano.

2. John Wayne does not have direct flights to Japan although it may be reasonably cheap to book a flight out of there that includes a layover in San Francisco. It looks like you may be looking at a flight that has an overnight layover with an airport change? So your layover will have you fly in to SNA and then out of LAX?

3. If you have nothing you want to do in Nagano other than see the monkeys, it may not be worth the trouble of going out there. January and February are probably the best months and there's a chance you'll be disappointed if you arrive in November and the monkeys are nowhere to be seen or just far away in the mountain rather than near the hot spring. Most likely, an international flight which involves several days in Osaka and several days in Tokyo with a flight between the two will be cheaper than flying in to Tokyo and then doing round trip shinkansen tickets to Osaka. You may need to fiddle around with the dates to get the best price.

OP here, I talked to my friend last night they tried to see the snow monkeys last year in December and were disappointed as they did not come to the hot springs. So marking this off our list.

Thanks for the thought on booking a flight between Tokyo and Osaka... I will look into it.

So I hit pause for a few minutes -

My friend sent over their last couple of trips plans, for me to look at. Their DD is married to a really nice Japanese guy they met in college. They do not stay with them due to their apartment is only a 1 bedroom and 1 bath. So they normally stay in a hotel, they like the perks it offers, and as well so not to impose on them with work life and newlywed life. They normally go for 3 weeks to a month at a time. So in looking at her plans, while we can't go for 3 weeks, more like 10 to 12 days, plus travel days, and one day to sleep when we get home. I started looking at them and I remember seeing a flight so I went to check it out.. On one trip they flew between Tokyo and Osaka round trip. They went for 3 nights in Osaka staying at Universal, the hotel that they stayed at in Tokyo allowed them to leave their large checked bags(2) with them, as they returned to that same hotel for 4 more nights stay. They only took their roll on's and a back packs... I need to ask them if they charged them for keeping the bags which would be fine with us. Do you know if this is a common practice with the luggage? If not suggestion for the checked bags? It would be much easier to just take enough stuff for a few days instead of lugging all the luggage. I just texted her and ask about the cost she said it was around 100.00 or so US dollars for round trip per person is that about right?

I did notice a note she had something about shipping luggage on a different trip? thoughts?

As always thanks for your help.

 

[dunkindonut]

keep in mind that USJ can close early so you need to watch the calendar, sometimes it closes at like 7pm. USJ is also totally doable in a single day, I got the express pass and thought it was worth it if you only want to dedicate a single day to USJ.

if you fly out of orlando to haneda, I would recommend just flying out of DC/IAD. DC has direct flights through ANA and it's great.

from some of the flight times i've seen, flying to osaka would take so long that you might just be better off using a shin kansen to osaka. It seems like some of the total trip times are 24 hours, which means you will likely have a 4+ hour layover. The shortest layover is an hour and a half, and I'm not sure if that's enough time to maneuver around san franciso international. even checking the ANA planes up till August, it doesn't seem like there's many options for ANA operated planes. It might be different, but the times up on the site right now are only up to october, but they won't find available flights.

 

[gelatoni fan]

I'm not a fan of shipping luggage because you'd have to go a day without your stuff but some people swear by it. I do sometimes leave my stuff at a hotel if I have a different hotel sandwiched in between two stays at the first hotel. If you're staying at a chain hotel like Marriott, Intercontinental or Prince, it should not be a problem to keep luggage there for multiple days entirely for free. Small local hotels under 10,000 JPY a night may not allow you to keep luggage other than the days of check in and check out.

$100 round trip is about right for a cheap round trip flight between Tokyo and Osaka but you also have to factor in the extra time and money to get to the airport compared to going to Tokyo station or Shin-Osaka station for the shinkansen. The other advantage of the shinkansen is flexibility to go when you want rather than be constrained by a flight booked months in advance. I prefer flying but most infrequent travelers prefer the shinkansen.

 

[MimitoAlex]

OP here,

I did have a question for everyone, can someone tell me how all the construction on Odaiba is going. My friends that were there last month, went over a few times to do things with the grandkiddo's she said there was alot of things were closed, and lots of stuff being built and refurbished and alot of the project looked all most finished. Any thoughts ?