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The original was posted on /r/japantravel by /u/Calmly-Stressed on 2024-11-25 06:21:27+00:00.

Me and a friend just finished our one-week road trip from Hachinohe to Sendai along the Michinoku coastal route. Since this is a much less visited area of Japan, I thought a trip report would be nice. 

For context: I lived in Sendai for a year and am fluent in Japanese, so this might be a different experience if you have a harder time communicating or are nervous about that kind of thing. We encountered very few people who spoke English but plenty who would have been willing to make do with Google translate or had some sort of pre-made English leaflet to work with. 

Itinerary

• Hachinohe. We took the Shinkansen to Hachinohe on Saturday evening so that we could catch the famous morning market on Sunday. We also visited the umineko shrine that marks the start of the Michinoku coastal trail. Picked up a rental car at Toyota and started our road trip towards Oirase, with a great stop at the Towada art center.
• Oirase. We splurged on a night at Hoshino Oirase Keiryuu and enjoyed their onsen, spa services and delicious buffet dinner and breakfast. We also used their shuttle bus service to explore the Oirase river with its waterfalls. We got surprised by the early first snow of the season so we didn’t walk around for too long. We drove by lake Towada on our way back to the coast, but unfortunately couldn’t see anything because of the snow and mist.
• Noda. We stayed at an old hotel in the middle of nowhere which had serious The Shining vibes. Not particularly recommended. We drove back up north a little to go to the Amber Museum in Kuji, which was surprisingly great, and then back south past various cliff viewpoints on the Michinoku. Stunning views all around.
• Tanohata. Again stayed at a hotel in the middle of nowhere on the coast, but less run down this time. The following day we took a detour inland to Iwaizumi to visit Ryusendo cave. We drove past various other great views on the way down to our next stop, including the impressive Kanko Hotel in Taro which has been left as it was since the tsunami.
• Miyako. We spent a lot of this day driving down from Miyako to Kesennuma, enjoying road stations and visitor centres on the way. We stopped at the tsunami museum in Rikuzen-Takata and took plenty of time there. Highly recommended.
• Kesennuma. We explored a little of Kesennuma itself in the morning before driving down the long stretch of coast to Matsushima, mostly enjoying road stations and views along the way. Onagawa is a particularly interesting visit. We stopped off at the manga museum in Ishinomaki, which is really fun even if you don’t know the specific manga or don’t read Japanese.
• Matsushima. We visited the evening light-up event in Zuiganji, then explored a little in the morning and visited Entsuin and Umanose before driving to Sendai to drop the car. Matsushima is great, more time there is recommended.
• Bonus side quest - we drove down to the Soma area in Fukushima prefecture with our friends over the weekend to hike Mt Karou and visit a few more Michinoku spots in the area. The most impressive and recommended was the Arahama primary school just outside of Sendai, which has been turned into a tsunami memorial. Extraordinary.

Recommendations 

• Tohoku is a stunningly beautiful region with tons of things to see. Having a car gave us the freedom to cover lots of distance and visit remote spots that would have been virtually impossible by public transport. That said, you can walk the entire Michinoku and get to lots of spots on it by public transport with good planning.
• Driving in Japan was very chill. There was almost no one on the road most of the time and it was a very uncomplicated experience. Car rental was also very easy and professional, and not very expensive: around USD 400 for one week, including drop-off 500km from pick-up and a very comprehensive insurance. Registering a second driver was free.
• We avoided highways almost entirely and chose to take the scenic route closer to the coastline for most of the trip. This was more time-consuming, but usually not by that much, e.g. 40 minutes between two stops versus 30 if you use the toll road. Occasionally we ended up on very narrow windy roads, which my friend enjoyed driving on a lot, but your mileage may vary.
• Japan’s road stations or michinoeki are a real experience in themselves, same with visitor centres. They often have comprehensive exhibits about the area, local products for sale, good food, clean restrooms, … We had a lot of fun stopping off at these points and just spending 15 minutes looking around or having a snack before driving off again.  One place in Iwaizumi had a massive parade float on display, while the station in Onagawa has an onsen.
• You can gather stamps on the Michinoku and in road stations and visitor centres. This was really fun to do and gave us focal points along the way, plus free souvenirs. So don’t worry, you don’t have to miss out on the stamp gathering experience if you’re not visiting JR stations.
• If your hotel is remote, order the kaiseki dinner they offer. We did not do this as we thought it would be too much, but in both remote hotels we stayed this meant settling for their on-the-spot restaurant option, one of which was underwhelming and the other one actively bad. Seems like they put lots of effort into their kaiseki dinners but the alternative was an afterthought.
• Related to the former point, think about where your hotel is located for food access. Twice when we stayed in a town, we made the mistake of getting a hotel that was far from the centre or next to a highway, so we still had to drive for dinner or walk a long way.
• All in all it was a wonderful experience, we learned tons about the tsunami and the recovery efforts and saw so much beautiful nature. The autumn colours were in full swing as well which made it even better. We could have easily spent another week on the same stretch of coast as we covered a lot of distance in the last two days and definitely missed out on more things to see and do in that area.

I know everyone wants to go to the golden route first time around, and I wouldn’t necessarily recommend this itinerary to first-time visitors as we didn’t get to see much of what usually draws people to Japan (traditional temples/retro-future cities). What we did get to see was the beauty and wild spirit of the north, the resilience and kindness of the local people, and the authentic life in the countryside. It was amazing. 

Feel free to ask away in the comments if there’s anything more you want to know!