Self-drive from Tokyo to Osaka

Plan to visit from 23/12 - 30/12/2011
1) 23/12 - Tokyo
2) 24/12 - drive from Tokyo to Nagoya
3) 25/12 - drive from Nagoya to kyoto
4) 26/12 - drive from kyoto to osaka
5) 27/12 - drive to/from osaka to nara
6) 28/12 - drive from osaka to nagoya
7) 29/12 - drive from nagoya to tokyo
or should i just purchase a JR rail way pass for 7-days. which one save more time for sightseeing? thanks.

Driving will be significantly more expensive, and slower. Mainly due to toll roads, fuel, hire car fees etc. You also may have issues with parking at certain hotels.

To be honest I would just recommend you get a 7-day JR Pass for your itinerary.

Enjoy your trip!

Public transportation is much quicker and more convenient to travel the big distances between Tokyo Nagoya and Osaka and to sightsee in these big cities where parking can be difficult to find.

A car can be great on the countryside, but generally not for quick trips along the urbanized Golden Route (Tokyo-Kyoto)

The Japan Rail Pass would be a good value. Or if you wish to travel more cheaply, you could consider highway buses:
http://www.japan-guide.com/e/e2366.html

Driving will be significantly more expensive

It depends on the number of travelers. For a larger group of travelers, a car can be quite economical.

Not that i am an experienced traveller in Japan...
For the price of a 7-day railpass you can also rent a car for a week. So if you travel with a couple of people renting a car is an alternative. But as mentioned. toll roads are expensive (and parking in cities is also expensive).
If you just go to the big/major cities using the train is the way to go. But if you also want to enjoy the off-beaten track or area's with only busses you might consider to rent a car.
To reduce cost of travelling long distances with a car you can use the non-toll roads. But in general these are very slow.
We (my wife and i) travel larger distances by train and than we hire locally a cars.
Have a nice trip
B. Slager

If 3 or more persons, traveling and sightseeing by car will ultimately be less expensive in a lot of cases.

However, since it is a vacation and driving can be a physical toll. Traffic is cities can be horrible and if you don't know the cities well, it is incredibly easy to get lost.

Driving in Kyoto or Nara, for example, is very straight-forward and not very stressful but cities like Tokyo, Osaka, Kobe, etc. that were rebuilt after the war don't any sense and the stress of navigating through cities could spoil your experience.

Despite potential savings, I would still recommend public transportation.

Parking is a problem too...
Good luck trying to use an automated parking machine or one of these parking lots that clamp the front wheels....last time I checked the instructions were in Japanese only....

Many hotels have limited parking and it is not free.
My Japanese friends have a car but they only use it on weekends for local trips or short trips in the region.
To go to work everyday or to travel far away they use the train (as many Europeans do, unless the whole family travel and take back roads all the way).

As Kyototrans mentions navigating cities might be a problem. That is if you use ordinary maps. Most if not all rental cars are nowadays equiped with navigating systems. However these are most of the time Japanese only. If you know how to operate these systems they are very handy. Personally i bring my own navigating device and i have (almost) no problem to navigate the cities.
B. Slager

Josephine,

So all in all, use the Japan Rail Pass, and then once you arrive at a city and feel like driving, rent a car at the spot. If cars are fully booked, that means the traffic is too heavy anyway.

Also, if you prefer to travel with a lot of luggage and are a skillful left-lane driver who hardly gets stressed trying to read foreign signs, driving might be a good option. Some people like to drive, some people don't. I would never drive in my hometown Tokyo, but my brother-in-law drives everywhere.

Hey all. My name is yong hwee, Josephine's husband.

I am the one who raised the idea of driving instead of taking train. I thought I should give some perspective and rationale on driving.

BTW, the driving idea is for city to city, not within city which I prefer to use subway. I thought driving will have more sightseeing opportunities, especially on-route, than in a train.

1. EXPERIENCE
This will be our 10th trip to Japan in 8 years - all via Tokyo, including one driving trip in Hokkaido in 2009. The rest are all by train.

I drive in Singapore (my country), and have driven in Dubai, Malaysia and Hokkaido.

Having taken train to Sendai, Kyoto, Yokohama, etc, it can get quite boring sitting in the train.

I like driving because it gives us opportunities to stop by the road any time when we spot sometime interesting.


2. COST
2 x JR Pass is about S$800. We calculated that car rental plus one week fuel is about the same. With toll, it may be another S$400 more.

We do not mind paying more. Saving S$400 isn't the point. The point is to experience the roads. We have taken Shinkansen many times already and I prefer 4 hours on the road than 2 hours on train.

And if we can get two more friends to come along, the cost will be halved.


3. STRESS, PROBLEMS, etc
Once we reach the city, we should just take the local subway instead.

Anyway I don't find city driving difficult, or figuring out how the parking machine work stressful. In fact, to me these are interesting experiences. It's not about just the food and sights, but the every day experiences (yes i know train is also a everyday experience but we have done that many many times).

I can read katakana only, but during the last trip in Hokkaido, the GPS was all Japanese and we had (almost) no problem.


Hopefully these gives more perspective to the driving suggestion :)

1. Driving in Hokkaido is completely different from driving Tokyo - Nagoya - Osaka route. I drove in Hokkaido, and I would not mind doing it again, but I would not along this Tokyo - Osaka route :)

3. Where would you park your car when you get to a major city? Some hotels within the city might not even have parking space available. Parking on the streets would be difficult.

But it's up to you - once we traveled with another couple who drove everyday throughout Tokyo for work, and they insisted on driving, so we rented a car and we went to Izu together... heavy traffic turned out to be a serious constraint on our sightseeing time that we quietly vowed that we would never do that again :)

Having taken train to Sendai, Kyoto, Yokohama, etc, it can get quite boring sitting in the train.

This seems to be personal preference. I myself have driven to Sendai a few times, I definitely prefer the train ride by a large margin. I find train rides much more interesting and comfortable than spending twice as much time on an expressway. They rarely come with the nice views you have from Hokkaido roads.

2 x JR Pass is about S$800. We calculated that car rental plus one week fuel is about the same. With toll, it may be another S$400 more.

Many more people could easily understand your calculations if you used yen or US$ instead of S$. You will have to find a very cheap car rental outlet for your calculation to be correct. Even a cheap 6000 yen per day translates into 42,000 yen. Tolls will be around 25,000 yen (the more stops you make along the way, the more expensive will the tolls be). And gasoline and parking fees probably another 10,000 yen. That totals 77,000 yen, which is considerably more expensive than two rail passes.

And if we can get two more friends to come along, the cost will be halved.

That's right. Although you will probably need a larger car for the luggage, which will translate into around 8,000 to 10,000 yen rental fees per day.

Anyway I don't find city driving difficult

You have never driven in big Japanese cities. Tokyo, in particular, with the many lanes, intersections and junctions is very stressful to navigate in my opinion. Driving in Sapporo does not compare to it.

I'm Singaporean, been to Japan several times and on the last trip, also driven in Central Japan.

For the route you are planning ie the Tokyo - Osaka route via Nagoya, I'd take the train. I think via expressways you really don't get much of a view.

Driving in the country is different - lots to see and the roads/pace of traffic etc is different. It's very scenic.

For three days car rental in Japan, we spent close to 27,000yen and this does not include tolls. So I think a car in short bursts, used on local roads, is best. But for the major long haul transport routes, I'd get there with less stress and less expense if I just take the train.

I think it ok to drive as he says he is accustomed to drive in SG.

My advice is to find your hotel in the suburban area, "near the End" of subway lines, which is easier to find a hotel with parking lot.

thanks everyone for the advice! we'll re-look at our plans based on the input. cheers.

Sorry to barge in when you're almost ending the thread, but whether driving gives more sightseeing opportunities or not totally depends on the roads you choose and your preference.

For example, for me and most if not all people I know, the scenery from the Tokaido Shinakansen is a great treat. The train runs on the very edge of the Pacific coastal line, and the big view of Mt. Fuji is the regular conversation for Shinkansen travellers.

On the other hand, a large part of the Tomei Express Way has walls on both sides to prevent noise and polution leeking, and on nice days there might be traffic jams. Then you have to worry about the toilet.

My brother-in-law always chooses to drive the Chuo Express Way between his home in eastern Tokyo and Nagoya. The scenery is much better and there is less traffic.

I also agree with the others that driving Hokkaido is greatly different from driving elsewhere. It is very common for locals to drive only in Hokkaido and other similar places where cars are more convenient than trains.

But you might have an adventure driving as long as you know what to expect.

We travelled to Japan last year on holiday for 5weeks and used a combination of rental cars and 7day JR Rail Pass.
Without any doubt you can see A LOT more at your own leisure by car. We could stop when we wanted to and admire views and scenery and experience different towns and restaurants off/away from the rail network. In the Shinkansen/Express train it's just too fast to see anything more than a moments glance at ~300km/h!
We never had a problem with parking at reasonable prices.
Even in downtown Tokyo our carspace was within ~4metres of where we were staying at Y100/hour! (You don't need/want a rental car in Tokyo though!)
We seldom took expressways so didn't often have to pay any tolls - but yes they are expensive. :(
By just using a RailPass one is VERY limited by being restricted just to trains for travel and sightseeing. Good for 'first time' Japan travellers though.
***The only other recommendation with a rental car is that you plan your driving tour to pickup and dropoff at the same or similar point, as dropoff fees are very expensive if you decide to dropoff a long way from the original pickup point! (Sometimes it's unavoidable though!)
We hire from the Too Coo website they have good deals with many different rental outlets throughout Japan.

Whoops - I should have read Josephine's original question a little more closely!

Josephine your listed driving itinerary is very tight/rushed! In your case I take back what I said about driving in Japan.
For YOUR trip I'd without a doubt definitely get a JR Rail Pass!

I agree with stewy- your itinerary is so rushed that if you drive that is basically all you will be doing most days. If you had several days in each city it might be an option, but not when you are planning to move on the very next day.

Definitely the train, and unless you have a reason you really want to see Nagoya, skip it in favour of more time in Kyoto for example.

It just hit me.

Speaking of rushed itinerary, you're not driving all of this by yourself, are you? If so, it is quite dangerous, because you are most likely to get tired or even sleepy and loose focus.

In Japan, drivers are strongly encougaged to take a break once in an hour or two as well as to switch drivers.

Your itinerary means at least 6 hours of almost non-stop driving, hardly any sleep if you are sightseeing, and then a short nap and there you go again.