We’re off again!

On the 25th of October we are once again flying from London to Tokyo for our fifth trip to beautiful Japan. This time we are heading into the largely unexplored northern region of Honshu, Tohoku, for koyo season. They say that only 1% of tourists visit Tohoku, and since I haven’t been since 2008 it is high time we fit into that 1%.

This time we are going for 23 days and currently plan to cover 2,500 miles by car and train. The map below shows our current planned destinations in order (although that is hard to see!).

We land at 5:30am in Haneda airport, our first time there, and immediately jump onto the shinkansen to Sendai for our first two nights to visit Matsushima bay and Yamadera temple in Yamagata. The trip then breaks down into five sections;

• Aomori
• Ichinoseki
• Aizu-wakamatsu
• Tokyo
• Mount Fuji

We will be renting four separate cars on this trip, which may seem a little excessive, but when we are covering large distances backtracking makes no sense, and neither does the £350 fee for returning the car at a different location.

In Aomori-ken we will be visiting scenes of natural beauty, and Tohoku’s only original Japanese castle, Hirosaki.

From Ichinoseki we will be exploring the tsunami hit jagged coastlines, limestone caves, and the “haunted” area of Tono.

In Aizu-wakamatsu we will be exploring Fukushima, the historical buildings and popping down to Mito to see one of Japans top gardens.

After two weeks in rural Japan we will settle back into the hustle and bustle of Tokyo before a week long road trip searching for the best views of Fuji.

After two years of planning (I immediately started planning after we got back from our 2017 sakura trip) I am so excited for this trip to be so close!

To read about what we ended up doing on our trip click here

If you have visited these areas before please let me know any recommendations! Happy Japlanning =]