Our Japan Itinerary

In addition to lots of exploring in Australia, we found time between boat jobs to visit Japan. It’s much closer than from North America, meaning no jet lag, so we took the opportunity to explore Japan. As is becoming our norm, we booked this trip last minute. Even with little advance planning, we liked our two week Japan itinerary. We got a taste of what a wonderful country it is.

Getting There

Port Macquarie in New South Wales only has a domestic airport, so we flew to Sydney, and then to Tokyo. It’s a one hour flight to Sydney with a 2.5 hour layover. Our 8 hour overnight flight arrived in Haneda early the next morning. Like 5:30am early.

Tokyo Haneda Airport Japan Itinerary — Planes at Tokyo’s Haneda Airport

We flew into Haneda Airport, which is definitely the preferred airport for easy access to the city. Arrivals took a long time. We had to wait in a few different lines and fill out forms for each one after we got to the terminal. It took at least an hour to do that, and then we needed to buy Suica cards, for use on all Japanese transport. Then we took the train to Tokyo.

When We Visited

We visited Japan in late May. The weather was mostly nice, except for a couple of days of rain, once in Tokyo and once in Kyoto. Otherwise it was good sightseeing weather: high teens and low 20s (C). Early May is high season to visit Japan because of local holidays and cherry blossoms. We missed both but was still very busy, but I’d rather that than be there in the heat of summer.

garden, Kyoto Palace, Japan itinerary — Garden at Kyoto Palace

Two Weeks in Japan Itinerary

It’s not a big country, in fact, 22 Japans fit inside Australia! But Japan is chock full of fun cities and beautiful towns, making it tough to decide where to go. On our first trip to Japan, we had two weeks so visited a lot of the top sites like Toyko and Kyoto. In addition to those two major sightseeing cities, we visited the mountain town of Nikko, historic Hiroshima, and fun and lively Osaka. Our two week Japan itinerary was full of delicious food and amazing sights. I can’t wait to return to this beautiful country for the culture, shopping, and convenience store egg sandwiches!

Five Nights in Tokyo

Our Japan itinerary started in Tokyo. We stayed in an APA hotel in Roppongi, in between several subway stations, but not close to any.

TIP for staying in Tokyo: Pick a hotel a few blocks from a station. You’ll be walking a lot so you may as well avoid walking to the subway.

Shinjuku crossing, Tokyo — Tokyo’s Shinjuku Crossing

Tokyo was incredible! What a massive lively fun city! We could spend months there and never see or do everything, so five nights was good. While in Tokyo, we shopped, went to a baseball game, saw live music, visited street markets, the Imperial Palace and museums, played video games, did a free walking tour, and rode lots of subways.

The moat at Tokyo's Imperial Palace — The moat at Tokyo’s Imperial Palace

Japan Itinerary: Two Nights in Nikko

From Tokyo, we took two trains to the mountain town of Nikko, a UNESCO World Heritage site. In Nikko, we walked a lot, visiting the famous shrines, and the lake and waterfalls. We also went to a sake distillery for a tour and tasting. The tour guide/owner of the distillery used google translate to teach us about the sake making process. Nikko is also home to some fun breweries and a very interesting Japanese only wine bar owned by a cat lover.

Next Stop: Kyoto

Kyoto shrine Fushimi Inari — Kyoto’s Fushimi Inari shrine was beautiful and very crowded

The two places we had to visit on our Japan itinerary were Tokyo and Kyoto, so we headed to Kyoto next. It’s known for beautiful temples, shrines and gardens, and is very popular with tourists. When we got off the high speed train from Tokyo at Kyoto station, all we saw were Westerners. We spent three nights in Kyoto, where we rented bikes, saw several shrines and temples, visited Nijo castle, and ate more delicious food. From Kyoto, we also took a day trip to Nara Park where the deer are wild yet almost domesticated.

deer, Nara Park, Japan — The deer are friendly in Nara Park

Hiroshima

It took us a couple of hours by train from Kyoto to get south to Hiroshima, also known as the City of Peace. With lovely waterfront trails and a castle, this city of over 1 million is defined by its bombing in WWII.

We had just two days in Hiroshima, where we visited the Peace park and Memorial museum. From there, we took a day trip to the Itsukushima Jinja, a Shinto temple with stunning floating gates, tame deer, and loads of tourists.

torii at Itsukushima Jinja — The tori at Itsukushima Jinja

Osaka

Osaka was a last minute addition to our trip. We debated visiting it a few times, and opted to go when we saw how close it was to Hiroshima. It was a great choice, and we loved Osaka’s fun streetscapes, excellent food, and sense of humour.

Osaka was our last stop for the final two nights of our Japan itinerary. We visited some skyscrapers, did a free walking tour, left our backpack on the subway (got it back), and ate some of Osaka’s famed delicacies. On our last day, we even experienced a private onsen, which we haven’t done since New Zealand.

Getting Around Japan

Trains are the main way to go when traveling Japan. From the high speed shinkansen, to the subway within cities, they take you everywhere. After so many road trips in Australia, it was nice to not have to worry about transport.

And we really didn’t worry. Google maps is super in directing which trains, platforms, etc to take. We found the hardest part was buying the correct tickets. A few times we just got in the English service line to have experts help us.