16 days tour

Hi Moshe,

Sorry for the somewhat late replay, I had to look up your old post and do some research for this one.

Here we go, I think both ideas will work out well but both have some advantages/disadvantages.

The 7-day pass option The 7-day pass + Wakayama Pass is probably the most economic way, especially if you can plan your travel to Hiroshima, Kyoto, Takayama and Tokyo in the 7 days of use (but I believe you planned to do this all in 9 days in your old itinerary?). Also the Wakayama Pass will be of great use for your itinerary since you can use it from Koya to Kansai Airport and to Nara without extra costs. When you get to Tokyo economic options [to get to Nikko are also available].

The total price for this would be
28,300 Yen 7 Day JR-Pass
5,500 Yen 3 Day Wakayama Pass.
3,800 Yen for the Nikko World heritage package.
5,000 Yen for the 2day Hakone Pass from Shinjuku, Tokyo (3day pass +500Yen)

For a total of 42,600

The 14-day pass option: The 14-day is about 16,800 Yen more than the 7 day pass but the extra time it gives to travel around can be very nice. It is a shame that it does not cover the full way to Koya-san but you can use it for your day trip to Nikko and ride the Shinkansen.

The total price for this would be
45,100 Yen 14-day JR-Pass
850 yen x 2 for Koyasan from Osaka and back.
3900 Yen for the 2day Hakone Pass from Odawara, You can use the Shinkansen to reach Odawara from Tokyo. (3day pass +500Yen)

For a total of 50,700.

As you can see the 14-day pass option is around 8,000 Yen more but you get more flexibility in return, for instance you could linger a bit longer around Takayama or Shirakawago.

Hope this helps with making a decision.

Best regards,
Daniel

Dear Daniel,

Thank you so much. We try to tune this trip as fine as possible and the process is complicated.We have some more questions:
1) Reserved seats - Is the JR Pass expensive then regular seats? What if it is the high season?

2) We prepared a detailed wishfull list ofJR trains and timetable. We will present them while validating the voucher. In case we will change our mind during the trip - will it be possible to make adaptations? How?

3) Going from Hyroshima to Kyoto - Some starnge Hyperdia advice:
a)" 0900 to Hyroshima Station. 5 Min. walk, then arrive at "Hyroshima"?
b) Then 43 ride to Kobe on the SHINKANSEN SAKURA 542.
c) What is the difference of "Hyroshima Station" and "Hyroshima", which platform?

4) Could not find a map of Kobe train station, is ther one?

5) Going from Koyasan to Nara - can we use the JR Pass from Gokurakubashi on?

6) JR Rapid from Osaka to Kansai - Which station in Osaka?

7) Is there a way to combine Hakone Pass and JR Pass?

8) Same for Niko ?
9) Can we by Hakone Pass and Tokyo-Niko round trip by the internet?

10) How to optimize Tokyo City transportation by JR Pass?

11) Off topic- We would like to by Takayama-Kanazawa-Shira.-Takayama round trip bus ticket and reserve hours. Can you please provide theire website or e-mail address of the bus company?

Thank you very much, your advises are very important.

Regards

Moshe

Hello again,

Looks like you are researching your trip very well, hope I can add to it.

1.) Seat reservations with the JR-Pass are completely free, if you don't have a JR Pass seat reservations generally are 250 Yen for a short trip or 500 for longer trips.

2.) The JR Staff will be able to make all the reservations for you once you exchange the JR-Pass, however you are not bound by them. Meaning that you can make changes whenever you want during the validity of the Pass. To do this simply go to a ticket office, bring your JR-Pass and previously booked tickets. Please return to tickets to the JR-Staff so they can free up the seats for other customers and make new reservations with the JR-Pass, this is completely free!

3.) This is an oddity I don't really know how to explain, for traveling to Hiroshima please use ''Hiroshima " as destination in Hyperdia.

4.) I don't have a station map of Kobe station but it is a very small station, so it won"t be hard to find anything. If you want to visit Kobe you probably want to go the station called Sannomiya as this is in the center of the city.

5.) You won't be able to use the pass from Gokurakubashi, the closest station to Koya san is Hashimoto, you can use the JR-Pass to travel from there!

6.) Osaka is a very large city and has many local stations. Osaka station itself is very close to Umeda, Shin-Osaka is from where the Shinkansen depart.

7.) Yes the Hakone pass works great to compliment the JR-Pass. For instance you can take the Bullet Train to Odawara and from there travel on my Hakone Pass without having to buy anything else besides the passes.

8.) Nikko can be reached by the JR so you won"t have to buy any additional passes. If you plan to visit it outside of the period that you use your JR-Pass you can save some money by buying a special package for Nikko, as mentioned before.

9.) You can"t buy these passes over the Internet but you can buy the Hakone Pass from Hakone or Shinjuku when you go to Hakone. You can buy the Nikko package at any of the Tobu Railway stations.

10.) You can maxiise your travel in Tokyo by trying to find an accommodation close to any station that is on the Yamanote-line this line makes a loop through Tokyo and stops at many of the great wards, including Shinjuku, Harajuku, Shibuya, Ikebukuro and Ueno.

11.) We had a similar question like this some time ago and Mari posted a great answer. You can find it here.

Let me know if you have more questions!
-Daniel

9.)