APOLOGIES IN ADVANCE FOR THE LENGTH – Finalising my itinerary and wanting to check it doesn't seem too wild/there isn't anything I didn't consider that might be a massive show stopper. Key things you might want to know:

• We're a couple in our mid/late 30s (with tattoos we can't easily cover)
• This is our 4th trip to Japan
• I'm aware the first week or so is quite full on and more heavily planned (we have some flexibility and I worked out the timings, I just didn't write it all down)
• We are quite fast paced travellers and don't tend to enjoy too much "down time". We function quite well going to bed later and still getting up early. Husband is a morning person so tends to get up very early (7:30ish) and I normally am between 8:00-8:30.
• Flights and accommodations are all paid for. Accommodations are all cancellable until close to the time (so we could shuffle if needed).
• Overall we are foodies, love craft beers (and cocktails/spirits), anime/manga, video games, general nerdiness (example – we like to buy and build Gunpla Gundams), and Japanese culture in general. We're pretty much open to trying new and/or unique experiences and money is (fortunately) not much of a limitation.

I've got some questions that I'll pop down at the end, but the biggest question is just a sense check around the following (I can shuffle a few bits around but if you have any obvious suggestions for what makes better sense, please do tell me):

Day 0 (Thurs, 16/10) – Fly out of LHR

Day 1 (Fri, 17/10) – Arrive at Haneda

• Land at 7:15. We'll forward our bags to Sendai (Day 9)
• Plan is to see how we're feeling, how quickly we can get out/send bags, and what the state of play is and then will either:
  • Go to DisneySea to eat all the thematic food from food stalls (this is the crazier option that is less likely to happen, but it's not a "no" – we aren't fussed about rides, it's more the principle as every trip I've said I'd go to DisneySea and haven't). If we do this. we'll by leaving around 18:00 , if not earlier (19:00 at the absolute latest), to get to Nagoya (~2hr 30 mins)
  • Go directly to Nagoya (~2 hr 15 mins). If we go directly to Nagoya, we'll just play it by ear in terms of exploring the area.
• Check-in to hotel, eat (if needed), and go to bed

Day 2 (Sat, 18/10) – Nagoya

• Slow start (depending on how we're feeling) / grab coffee
• AM – Sekigahara (could move this to "tomorrow" and have a full day for a day trip)
• PM – TBC (open to suggestions)

Day 3 (Sun, 19/10) – Nakatsugawa

• Check out/grab coffee
• AM – TBC (open to suggestions)
• PM – Nakatsugawa (where we're staying for the night). Plan to get a relatively early night as we'll be doing the Nakasendo the next few days with early morning rises.

Day 4 (Mon, 20/10) – Nakasendo 1

• Grab coffee & walk Nakatsugawa –> Ochiai –> Magome-juku (alternative plan is to grab the bus to Ochiai if needed for some reason). Plan to be up/out/walking by 8:30.
• Explore Magome for 60-90 mins
• Walk Magome –> Tsumago-juku
• Explore Tsumago for 60-90 mins
• Depending on the timings, we either walk or take the bus from Tsumago –> Nagiso
• Train from Nagiso –> Kiso-Fukushima (aiming to get the 18:16 that will arrive in KF at 19:13)
• Check-in to accommodation, eat, early night

Day 5 (Tues, 21/10) – Nakasendo 2

• Wake up, grab coffee, and explore KF
• Catch 11:03 train KF –> Yabuhara (arrive at 11:19). Next train isn't for a while after, so this is non-negotiable
• Walk Yabuhara –> Narai-Juku
• Explore Narai-juku (~2-4 hours)
• Train from Narai –> Matsumoto
• Depending on timing/our mood, optional stop in Shiojiri for Sake tasting, or go to hotel in Matsumoto to check in, then come back to Shiojiri
• Check in/shower
• Grab dinner and walk around the castle area in the evening (here it's nice in the evening).

Day 6 (Weds, 22/10) – Matsumoto

• Get up, grab a coffee, and rent car (plan to be with car by 9:00)
• Day trip to Kusatsu Onsen
• Leave Kusatsu around 16:30/17:00
• Late(ish) dinner (if we didn't already eat) and drinks

Day 7 (Thurs, 23/10) – Aizu-Wakamatsu

• Check out/grab coffee
• Finish up Matsumoto (depending on the previous days, we may have done some of the other bits already)
  • Castle (priority first thing)
  • Nawate/Frog Street
  • Nakamachi Street
  • Kurassic-Kan
• Grab food/snacks and travel (public transport) from Matsumoto –> Aizu-Wakamatsu
• Check into onsen (Harataki) and spend the rest of the day soaking and relaxing (they seem to be tattoo friendly from all we can tell, but if for some reason that has changed and it's not clear, we have a private bath in our room and can rent their private baths as well).

Day 8 (Fri, 24/10) – Aizu-Wakamatsu

• AM – explore Aizu-Wakamatsu
• PM
  • Lunch in Kitakata
  • Finish up anything remaining in A-W
  • More soaking in the evening

Day 9 (Sat, 25/10) – Sendai

• Early(ish) wake up and quick final soaks
• Grab coffee and/or walk around if there's any last minute things remaining
• Train from A-W –> Nihonmatsu (tentatively planning to make the 10:55 train that will get us there by 12:17)
• Explore Nihonmatsu – currently Ebisu circuit is the main POI (as my husband is a Japanese car guy and we think the drift course could be cool)
• Train from Nihonmatsu –> Sendai (targeting the 17:13 train that gets us in at 18:25)
• Check into hotel and grab dinner/drinks (no early morning is needed and less scheduled moving forward….

Days 10-16 (Sun, 16/10 – Sat, 01/11) – Sendai

• Currently working out the best flow and day trips/half day trips. Nothing set in stone, we're just going to go with what we feel like on a particular day, but currently looking at doing the following across the days
  • AM – Morioka / PM – Sendai
  • AM – Yamadera / PM – Ginzan Onsen –> Yamagata (we very well might remove Ginzan or Yamagata – looking into it, it does seem busy but achievable as we don't have any "can't be missed" spots in Yamagata)
  • Full Day – Matsushima Bay (unsure if we need a full day or a half day. Might just need just over a half day and finish in Sendai)

Day 17 (Mon, 02/11) – Tokyo

• Travel back from Sendai –> Tokyo. No set time we plan on leaving or need to arrive in Tokyo, sort of playing it by ear a bit.
• Plan to stop in Fukushima City on the way back. Open to any other stops that are easy on the way back instead?
  • Ideally wanted to do a tour exploring the impacted areas from the 2011 disaster and the growth that's happened since, but the one tour I found that covered what I was wanting to see (educational, not just dark tourism) had no availability and I haven't been able to find anything since.

Day 18 – 22 (Tues, 03/11 – Fri, 07/11) – Tokyo

• We're staying in Koenji and want to try to explore the "lesser travelled" areas of Tokyo while also visiting our favourite spots (appreciate nowhere is really "Lesser travelled", but just mean not Shinjuku, Shibuya, Ginza, etc. etc.)
• Planning to do some day trips. We've done Enoshima/Kamakura/Yokohama/Kawasaki already on past trips as well as staying in Hakone. This time we're considering Fuji area.
• Husband is looking to rent a JDM and drive on one of the days (or at least half day). This might bring us towards the Saitama area as this was one branch he knew had the car he wanted to rent. Any particularly good drives people can recommend? (He's already all over it, but thought I'd also ask just in case)
• Last day (7th) we'll probably be dedicating that to shopping, packing, and prioritising any final stops we can't miss.

Day 23 (Sat, 08/11) – FLY HOME

• Early morning flight home (thankfully landing on the same day so we have Sunday to recover and be sad!)

Questions:

– I understand there's not a lot in Nagoya. Any experiences or "must see" spots you most recommend that might get overlooked when google searching/reading threads?

– Debating whether or not we should do Ghibli park. We did the Ghibli museum in Tokyo years ago and I really enjoyed it, but for some reason Ghibli Park doesn't excite me the way I'd expect it to. I heard it's not worth it if you don't have access to all the sites and a lot of the reviews I've seen are families (with children) or people that live and breathe Ghibli. I enjoy Ghibli films but wouldn't say I'm that hardcore and I'm not bothered about exclusive merch. Is it worth going as two adults without kids?

– Day 2 I've tentatively pencilled in Sekigahara, but we could be flexible and shuffle it to the morning on Day 3 to give ourselves a full day to do something else using Nagoya as a base. Any suggestions of how to use either that full day or a half day after Seki?

– Day 3 we're staying in Nakatsugawa. I don't have a lot of things I personally was needing/wanting to do here, just easiest place to base before doing Naksendo. Anything not to be missed that I might not find easily? Or should I be just going there to eat/sleep and focus time somewhere else close by for most of the day?

– Currently at least 4 full days without any rough idea/plan using Sendai as a base. Any suggestions for good day trips?? (Ideally 2 hours absolute max away). We can rent a car if need (already have international license) as long as it's a good use of time/money (and not just something to spend a short time at/can easily get the train to).

– Asked before but didn't really get a response, any recommendations for good tours or self guided tours/suggestions for covering some of the disaster sites in/around Fukushima? Not really interesting in the reactor or anything – I'm wanting to ideally have a guided tour where they can explain what happened, educate, and then show around regeneration of the area(s).

– Genuinely not a lot on our radar for Tokyo. Any suggestions for day trips for 4th timers? We've done the usual already (Yokohama, Enoshima, Kamakura, Hakone, etc.)

– What are your favourite lesser travelled areas within Tokyo? For example, I don't feel like enough people were talking about Shimokita before I went there in 2023 so it was a pleasant surprise (we even found a beer festival!) and I would recommend that spot to anybody – especially craft beer lovers.