Pre-planning late April trip. Need some help.

[Nomarian]

Hello all,

I am trying to plan our late April trip to Japan and could use some help. I have been reading a lot of the posts, but still cannot seem to pinpoint the information I need. Any help to these questions would be greatly appreciated.

1.) Hotel - I know we are going to stay at the Disneyland hotel in one of the character rooms, so we can get the 3 beds for our family of 4. Looking online, I cannot seem to book any other hotel besides the ambassador hotel. Does this mean I have to book the tickets and hotel separately if I want to stay at the Disneyland hotel?
2.) Tickets - If I cannot book a package, is it better to wait until I get to the hotel to get my tickets? That is what I got from some of the posts.
3.) Universal Studios - We would also like to spend a day or two at Universal studios Japan. I am looking at the bullet trains, but have a few questions.
- The 7 day rail pass seems like overkill, but might be worth it if I take it to Osaka and then back to the Tokyo airport?
- Or just buy a single bullet train pass and fly out of Osaka back to Houston?

Thanks in advance for any help. It is great to have someplace to help plan and gather information.

 

[wanderlust7]

The packages are only for the Ambassador Hotel (for foreign guests anyways). So yes, you would need to book hotel and tickets separately. The packages are pretty expensive (more than the cost of hotel + tickets) since they include extra perks.

As long as you're not worried about tickets selling out for the dates you want, just get them at your hotel. If you want the tickets that lets you park hop everyday only for Disney hotel guests, you can't buy those online anyways.

If flying out of Osaka is the same price or not much more, that would definitely be the better option. Otherwise, you'll need to price out paying out of pocket vs the rail pass. hyperdia.com has the fares.

Have a great trip!

 

[wanderlust7]

I just remembered, Disney hotel guests are guaranteed admission anyways, so no worries about tickets selling out...assuming you're not doing a split stay with a non-Disney hotel.

 

[Nomarian]

Excellent. Thanks for the information!

 

[AquaDame]

- The 7 day rail pass seems like overkill, but might be worth it if I take it to Osaka and then back to the Tokyo airport?
- Or just buy a single bullet train pass and fly out of Osaka back to Houston?

This may depend on which bullet train you want to take. We opted to not buy the railpass because it doesn't allow you to take the Nozomi bullet train which we want to do. You CAN use it for tickets on the Hikari which doesn't add that much time to your trip. It was important to us to ride "the fastest". I know, I know... kind of silly. The only use we'd get out of it aside from that would be the Narita express (~¥40000 IIR) and using the metro day to day... I tried to do the math and it seems like unless we go nuts and ride it a long distance or more than 4 or 5 trips a day its going to be cheaper to just prepay fare for that on a suica/pasma cards. Maybe someone will chime in who knows more about them though.

If airfare isn't much more to fly home from Osaka than Tokyo I'd probably leave from there so you don't have to backtrack.

 

[AquaDame]

Oh, I also forgot to mention that we ALSO found that while it is possible to get to Hakone for a day trip using the railpass it is again much quicker/straight forward to buy a different pass that is more direct.

 

[MomoMama]

You can also consider flying between Tokyo and Osaka. Discount air ticket starts around $50 one-way. Since most flight deals to Japan from Houston go to Narita, and there is no direct flight to Osaka, we flew to Narita and then flew from/to Osaka. On the most recent trip, we took Shinkansen one-way, and flew Skymark one-way. We much prefer 1-hour flight over 3-hour train ride.

 

[AquaDame]

Is flying much different in Japan..? I like flying but I don't like the time and hassle at security to do it. There is more to see outside the window usually but seeing Fuji from above would be fun too!

 

[Kyjin]

Essentially the 7-day rail pass is a good deal if you make a round trip between Kyoto and Tokyo during your trip. Like others have said, I'd look at airfare, and perhaps considering doing one way and flying out of Osaka.

Personally I prefer the shinkansen to plane travel since I like looking at the scenery and don't have to deal with security/checking bags, etc., but I've heard you can get some pretty good discounts for tickets.

 

[Nomarian]

Thanks for all the replies. I actually want the family to experience a bullet train, so doing that one time makes sense for us.

 

[Berliozzy]

Hi Nomarian,

Have you double checked that you are able to make a Disney hotel booking? They recently changed their policy so that they no longer accept foreign visas (But this may not effect you as they still accept a few other types of cards). At present you can only book a package in the Ambassador, but it looked quite expensive when I checked and you're restricted to two days I believe.

The bullet train is a fun experience! It used to be that the 7 day railcard was worth the money just for a single return trip from Tokyo - Kyoto, but I'm not so sure it is now, depending on how your currency converts atm. It is a nice journey though and very easy!

 

[MomoMama]

Is flying much different in Japan..? I like flying but I don't like the time and hassle at security to do it. There is more to see outside the window usually but seeing Fuji from above would be fun too!

I do not have a lot of flying experiences to compare various airports, airlines, and routes, but I found flying in Japan to be easy so far. I have not experienced long lines (mid-day, weekdays) at the security or check-in counters. And domestic flight does not seem to have strict regulations about bringing in liquids, etc. The airport employees are so polite and nice too...One time my DD had small scissors in her carry-on backpack. A bag-check worker found them, measured them, and found the scissors to be too big to be brought on. She was so apologetic that she had to confiscate the scissors from us...I was like, I should be the one apologizing!

I think ANA or JAL had a page showing which flight to take to see Mt.Fuji from above.
So far I have not seen Mt. Fuji from flight or train. We took Shinkansen in the evening, and it was too dark to see anything outside. DD slept through her first Shinkansen experience.

 

[Nomarian]

Berliozzy, thanks. I did run through the site all the way up to payment, but did not try to pay yet. I think I should be good as I have all the major cards and hopefully, they will take one of them!

 

[MomoMama]

Are you traveling before 4/29, beginning of the golden week? Many people travel during the golden week, and getting reserved seats for Shinkansen could be harder. I actually could not find 2 seats together for the reserved seats section on our weekend train ride in November. Luckily the train was not full and we could sit together in the non-reserved area.

 

[Nomarian]

MomoMama, no, we plan to go during the week in late April. The crowd calendars so far show that to be very light.

 

[Nomarian]

Hmm. I have been reading trip reports and looking at menus. Is there no Diet Coke in the parks?

 

[Berliozzy]

Hmm. I have been reading trip reports and looking at menus. Is there no Diet Coke in the parks?

When I was there I recall there just being a standard cola option, which was pretty much the same almost everywhere I went.

I've been there around late April and trains were all good. Disney resort was pretty busy to me although it was meant to be light...I think I'm just not used to the crowds there!

 

[OldSchoolReasons]

OP - can you report back on once you've booked? Apparently it only allows MasterCard outside Japan and I'm having to get a card specially because of it - want to check MC works before I sign up for one.

 

[Nomarian]

Yep, I can report back once I am booked. I am still trying to finalize our schedule, but will do it once I have it done and settled.

 

[KirstinK]

Hmm. I have been reading trip reports and looking at menus. Is there no Diet Coke in the parks?

I remember seeing Coke Zero at the restaurant with the Shellie May and Duffy show. I'm not sure if it is sold in many other places throughout the park though.