Hi my parents and I are travelling late November/early December for 20 days and 19 nights. I've come up with a basic itinerary i thought would be good. Could anyone comment on if it is too packed/rushed and too much travelling, and also on if there are any additional train passes would be good. Any other improvements would also be appreciated!
I've actually changed the itinerary once so we'd stay two nights at lake kawaguchi since we only really have a half day there (if we stayed a night) after travelling for so long. I do want to see matsumoto castle and a temple in nagano and it seems like it can be quickly done, so i rearranged it as follows:
22/11/2014 Arrive 0720 Narita Airport - Lake Kawaguchi reach around 1300
23/11/2014 Lake Kawaguchi Five Lakes
24/11/2014 Kawaguchiko - Matsumoto Castle - Snow Monkeys Shibu Onsen
25/11/2014 Shibu Onsen - Nagano - Matsumoto to Takayama (bus)Stop by Hirasu Onsen
26/11/2014 Takayama
27/11/2014 Takayama - Kanazawa Early Morning
28/11/2014 Kanazawa - Osaka afternoon
29/11/2014 Osaka - Mt Koya
30/11/2014 Mt Koya - Miyajima On the way Stop by himeji castle
1/12/2014 Hiroshima - Kyoto
2/12/2014 Kyoto
3/12/2014 Kyoto
4/12/2014 Day trip to Nara
5/12/2014 Kyoto - Kinosaki Onsen 14 day mark
6/12/2014 Kinosaki Onsen - Tokyo
7/12/2014 Tokyo
8/12/2014 Day trips
9/12/2014
10/12/2014
11/12/2014 Depart Narita Airport 1215
With this itinerary is it best to get either:
1) A 14 day JR pass, activate it on 24/11/14 so that it covers my Kinosaki onsen - tokyo trip and ends on the 7/12/14? For the beginning I would get a suica n'ex deal and then from shinjuku station buy a ticket to kawaguchiko station and get a two day pass for the buses (or is there a deal I can get with both). and then after the pass expires use suica around tokyo, plus possible day trip to Nikko or Kamakura and buy a one way n'ex or find another way to get to narita airport.
2) just get a 21 day pass?
Also this planning may be all for nothing... is it too early to book accomodation? I'm not sure if there's some holiday or you need to book ryokan and other accom months in advance but almost everything is booked out at Lake Kawaguchi on those dates. Also with shibu onsen and even kinosaki onsen. I went to the website of one of the ryokan and I could see I was able to reserve a room almost anyday 2 weeks in advance but it stopped at August. Is that the reason the search websites say everything is booked out?
Thanks for your help