[atan64]

Hi everyone, I am really excited...why? because I just booked my airline ticket to Tokyo from Vancouver, Canada.

I have been to Japan before, it was 1976 and I was 12 years old with my Mom and sister. I remembered it well, we stayed with relatives mostly in the Wakayama Ken prefecture.

So now my sister and I and our spouses and our parents will be travelling together. The six of us will be staying a total of 15 nights in Japan and we had roughly put an itinery together and I wanted to see what others think about it. Any suggestions also would be much appreciated. We will stay for 5 nights in Tokyo before heading west. We are going to get a 14 day rail pass as well.

Oct 16th - Arrive at Narita Airport and take the train into Tokyo. We should be in Tokyo in the early evening...haven't decided quite yet which area to stay in. At the moment, I am thinking to stay close to the Shinjuku Station.

Oct 17th - Explore Shibuya and Harajuku district and Meiji Shrine.

Oct 18th - Another day of exploring Tokyo. Not decided what to see yet.

Oct 19th - Day trip to Kamakura and return in the evening.

Oct 20th - Day trip to Yokohama and return in the evening.

Oct 21st - Take the Shinkansen in the morning to Hiroshima, however
Make a stop at Himeji and see the famous Castle. How much
time would we need to allocate to see the castle? We would
spend one night in Hiroshima and then see the A-Bomb site
the next morning. We were thinking of taking a short trip over
Miyajima before taking the train in the late afternoon or early
evening to Kyoto, where we would stay for 7 nights. We are
allocating 4 days to explore Kyoto and 3 days of day trips ie.
Osaka, Nara, Kobe? We for sure want to see Osaka and Nara,
Not too sure about Kobe...any suggestions?

Oct 29th - take the train from Kyoto back to Tokyo and spend two more
nights before heading back home to Canada. This will give us
about 3.5 days in Tokyo in total to explore.

Oct 31st - Depart Narita Airport.

Once we have the itinerary setup, then I can start booking hotels. Thanks in advance for your assistance...Cheers!