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Wondering what is the cheapest option to travel along my route. Seeing this question, it might be cheaper to buy a single ticket rather than multiple tickets (Tokyo -> Kyoto via Nagano and Kanazawa as stopovers on single JR ticket - is it possible?)

Starting from Tokyo 1st of May morning, spend 2 nights in Nagano and Matsumoto and then on the 3rd evening arrive in Kyoto, stay 3 nights there and on the 6th evening take the train to Hiroshima.

I understand that I should buy a base ticket with these stations. How can I write them in Japanese to give it to the teller? The JR Railpass seems to be more expensive than individual tickets given the recent price increase.

The return will be from Hiroshima to Tokyo, with a 3 days stop in Hakone (or one of the stations near Hakone where it makes sense to stop).

Does this make sense? Is it doable with JR rules?

Travel guy
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2 Answers2

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Your itinerary looks something like this:

  • 東京 Tōkyō
    • 北陸新幹線 Hokuriku Shinkansen
  • 長野 Nagano
    • しなの特急 Shinano Limited Express
  • 松本 Matsumoto
    • しなの特急 Shinano Limited Express
    • 名古屋 Nagoya
    • 東海道新幹線 Tōkaidō Shinkansen
  • 京都 Kyōto
    • 東海道新幹線 Tōkaidō Shinkansen
  • 広島 Hiroshima

Your return is a bit more vague, but might look something like:

  • 広島 Hiroshima
    • 東海道新幹線のぞみ Tōkaidō Shinkansen Nozomi *
    • 名古屋 Nagoya *
    • 東海道新幹線ひかり Tōkaidō Shinkansen Hikari
  • 小田原 Odawara
    • 箱根登山電車 Hakone Tōzan Railway (not JR!)
  • 箱根湯本 Hakone Yumoto
    • 小田急ロマンスカー Odakyu Romancecar (not JR!)
  • 大手町 Ōtemachi (Tōkyō)

* The Hikari Shinkansen is the slower train with more stops. It does run between Hiroshima and Odawara, but I'm not sure if it runs all the way, or you may need to change in Osaka anyway. If so, you may also take the faster Nozomi to Nagoya and change there. And the Hikari is generally cheaper, so you can consider which you prefer.

Plugging all this into the JR Fare Calculator, if you did it all within 7 days, you'd be ahead with the JR Pass. But since it sounds like you'll take longer than that, the 14 day pass will already be more expensive by quite a substantial amount. So yes, looks like it's worth buying individual tickets.

Laurel
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deceze
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It is always cheaper to buy a through ticket and stop over than to buy separate tickets (excluding any special discounted tickets), at least for base tickets; that is how railway ticketing works.

But note that you cannot stay any number of nights you want to. Your itinerary is 1,001.4 km, and according to JR's rules, your ticket is valid for 6 days. This means that your travel must end on the 6th day, with the day when you commenced your travel counting as day 1. So your plan is perfect here, but a bit tight.

You can buy your ticket easily. In fact you don't even have to see a person. On a "green" ticketing machine, you can select your route by indicating which stations (at most 3) you want to travel through. Just select "route search", say you want to travel from Tokyo to Hiroshima via Nagano and Matsumoto, and the machine will find the route for you. Then you're all set. You can either buy limited express tickets beforehand (along with your fare ticket), or right before you take the train. Just note that these don't allow any stopovers whatsoever.

xuq01
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