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The original was posted on /r/japantravel by /u/metafire18 on 2024-02-11 00:57:08.

Hi there,

I wanted to share a program/itinerary that worked well for us and potentially for anyone looking for a good mix of “old/traditional”, geeky, fun and yummy travel in Japan. If I had to do it all over again, I’d take the same route, because it was great!

I also try to write down some information that may be useful for others to save time and reduce anxiety :-) I think most of them have already been mentioned at least once on Reedit, though!

For the context, it was our first trip in Japan with my wife. 18 days including travel time. We wanted to go during November to enjoy autumn colors of mapple tree. It turned out that temperatures were abnormally high and autumn was delayed lol. We were still able to enjoy the autumn colors on the second part of our stay. For the record, the progress of autumn varies drastically from city to city. Kyoto seems to be the most advanced, I’d say (confirmed by a map/schedule found on site).

Stages

Day 1 * Our flight was at 9am and we arrived at Haneda airport (closer than Narita) around 7am the next day. We picked up our Pocket Wifi and loaded the Suica card. It’s very practical to do it at the airport if you do it right. We stayed at Ginza during our stay in Tokyo. It’s a nice place. Classy and quiet. Ginza is also very convenient for navigating the city, thanks to the nearby JR station. * Pokemon Center DX. There is a Pokemon Coffee in Ginza. It is not too packed in November. There is no need to book in advance IMO but we did not try to enter either. We did 3 or 4 Pokémon Centers during our trip in Japan. I can’t think of a single one that stood out, either positively or negatively. They all offer something different in terms of decoration and are well worth a visit. * The Imperial Palace. There is a park with the foundations of a dungeon + small guardian houses. Not essential IMO but it does not cost much to go through. * We head then to Ochanomizu on our way to Akihabara. This place is full of music stores (guitars, basses, amps and stuff). As a musician, it’s cool to see such giant displays for Gibson or Fender products. We then arrived in Akihabara to get a glimpse of the famous Electronic Town. During the week, the place is not packed at all. I would recommend to come at night time to see the neon lights. Also during the weekend, the streets are closed for the cars which make the experience different (and nicer). This place is a mix of maid coffee, arcade and Pachinko centers, IT stores and geek stuff. * We finished this first day with Ueno Park which is close to Akihabara. It’s a nice park. It must be beautiful in Spring. This year, there was a delay for fall colors as the temperature were higher than ever in Japan (no snow in Mt Fuji either!!!). We went to the natural museum. If you did not have the chance to do a relatively big natural museum before, that’s your chance. * Regarding food, we went to a ramen restaurant in the morning. We were not used to the ticket machine that is used in a lot of restaurant. The staff was not helping us much so quite disappointing experience to start but that was the only time we had to complain. Most of the time, staff in Japan are super nice and ready to help. We took ramen with shrimp tempura and it was super good. For dinner, we went to a Konbini (Family Mart seems bigger than 7 eleven I would say) and picked some Onigiri and Tayaki with custard. The food was very good value for our euros.

Day 2 * Big day with Shibuya in the programme. We started the day with Harajuku, the street of cosplayers and kawai culture. During the week, there are a lot of people in the street but not so many cosplayers. Nice experience though. You can pick some funny food here like fluffy pancake or barbe à papa. * We then headed to a zen experience at Meji-jingu temple. It was very nice. Not too many people during weekday. I would recommend to not go during the weekend if you are looking for a zen experience. The Yoyogi park just near the temple is very nice too. You are then near Shibuya. * Our goal was to first visit places like the Nintendo store. If you go in this building, I would recommend to go downstairs. There is a full floor of restaurants with an interesting ambience and a lot of choices. We then went to the cyberspace floor to visit the Nintendo store, Pokemon Center, Jump Store, Capcom Store, etc. One of the highlight of Tokyo for me as a big fan of video games and manga. A little disappointed by the Jump store which is rather small. In general, I was expecting bigger thing regarding “old and famous” shonen like Naruto and One Piece in Tokyo. Anyway, we spent a good amount of Yens here. * From here, you can take a door in this floor that lead outside where you can take nice picture in front of Mario Artwork and a sign “Nintendo Tokyo”. Then take the stairs to reach a nice rooftop garden and have a view on Shibuya. I felt like I was in a cyberpunk city. We went then to another building where there is two big manga shops including Mandarake. Impressive quantities of manga and figurines. A must see before heading to Shibuya scramble crossing. * Shibuya scramble crossing is super impressive to see live. Of course, you need to cross it 1-2 times and feel the experience. You can enter the buildings near to have a higher view. There is a street full of restaurant near Shibuya. We went for food after saying hello to Hachiko.

Day 3 * Heading to Kamakura for the third day to have a little break from the big town. My advice would be to take the JR line to Kita Kamakura and then there is an interesting path to follow which is packed with temples, both buddhist and shintoist. * We visited a number of temples during the day, the names of which I’ve forgotten, sorry for that! * To eat, there is a big avenue full of restaurants. Do not hesitate to take small perpendicular street. We found a very nice family restaurant here with super good oudon and tonkatsu. Super cool experience. * Then we went to the famous bhudda and finished this journey with a view of the ocean. We were not able to see the Mt Fuji from the beach but I read that it may have good spot to view it on sunny day. From the beach, the train station is at 20min walk.

Day 4 * We went to Shinjuku for the afternoon. We visited the Gyoen Park. Very nice park with different styles of garden : italian, french and japanese. There was a chrysantem exhibition by the time. If you have the chance to see the 1000 thousands flowers style one day, its worth it!!! * We then went to Square Enix shop and coffee. The place is rather small but still cool with a lot of figurines from our favorite franchises including Final Fantasy, Dragon Quest and Kingdom Hearth… We passed by the Square Enix building company without knowing it so pay attention. Apparently there is a stone with Square Enix writing on it. * We then went through Kabuchiko street. Interesting to see the volume of host/hostess coffee lol. We reach then Gigo (always fun to spend few hundreds yens in arcade game, the drum games are pretty funny), the Godzilla head, the 3D cat crossing (a must see of course lol). * Then, it was night time and we wanted to have a view of the whole city. We went to the Metropolitan Governement building. I recommend it. It’s free to take the lift to the 45th floor. Super impressive view on many famous places and building of the city. * We ended the day with an activity you won’t want to miss. We went to Omoide Yokocho after drinking few beers. This street is crazy. Its super tiny and packed with barbecue restaurants. The restaurant have 6-10 places where you can sit and enjoy street food. We went then to Gold Gai. Same concept but for sake and beer. One of the highlight of the trip for me.

Day 5 * On Sunday, we started the day in Ghinza visiting the Sony store and then went to Asakusa. Not sure if its the best idea to visit temples during the week end. The place was heavily crowded. The temple in itself is beautiful but the crowd may “ruin” the ambience here. We also did the big street food and souvenir shop street near the temple. Nice but again, too crowdy. * We finish the day at Akihabara as we did not had the opportunity to see it by night. We also found out that the city is closing certain streets during week ends including the main street of Akihabara. The feeling is different to walk on the center of such a big street. We did a couple of arcade games, a shop selling robots Gundam and others and a IT shop. * It was then time to say goodbye to Tokyo. Last night here and then we headed to Kanazawa.

Day 6 * First experience with the Shinkansen from Tokyo to Kanazawa. Super nice experience. Cannot emphasise enough how much Japanese are organized when talking about public transportation. The Shinkansen is the point d’orgue of this. The little ballet of train preparation, people waiting in line and stuff is something to see and experience. * We arrived at Kanazawa in the morning. The city is very rainy it seems and we experienced it. We stayed in the train station few hours, booking tickets for Shirakawa-go for the day after, lunch and stuff. If you want to go to Shirakawa or others alpin small towns, book as soon as possible. It seems like the buses are full quickly especially the ones in the morning. * Then we headed to our first Ryokan of the trip. Ryokan is a must do if you have the opportunity. Sleeping in a Futon, siting on tatami,…

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