need a little help

Hi there!

Good idea to give yourselves a day to rest up before you hit the road. Luckily you guys are coming from Australia so there won't be too much jetlag (as long as you can sleep on the plane.....).

Looking at your itinerary, you have a 10 day period in between Tokyo and Nozawa onsen that you can use for travelling around the country. I think I'd structure it with 6 or 7 days based out of Osaka or Kyoto with day trips and 1 night stays branching off from here. I'd follow this up with your trips north to Takayama/Matsumoto. Something like as follows:

5th-11th Based out of Kyoto/Osaka

• 5th Kyoto (Osaka evening for nightlife?)
• 6th Kyoto
• 7th Arashiyama morning, Nara afternoon, Kyoto evening & night
• 8th ??
• 9th Hiroshima. Night on Miyajima. Leave luggage at coin locker at Shin-Osaka station when you transfer.
• 10th Miyajima, more Hiroshima, train back to Shin-Osaka, Grab luggage. Sleep in Osaka or onto Nagoya.
• 11th to Takayama and sleep there.
• 12th Takayama + flexible shirakawago daytrip
• 13th [Bus from Takayama to Matsumoto over the alps] - (not JR)
• 14th train to Togarinozawaonsen

On the 8th you have a few options. You could go stay in Osaka for the day/night, or could keep exploring Kyoto and the surrounding area. Maybe a one night in Osaka would be good here, but it's very much up to how relaxed you want the travel to be I think.

Hope this helps!