Hello
My husband and I are going to be visiting Japan and we are wondering if it is more economical to buy individual rail tickets for our train journeys or should we buy a 14 day rail pass. Can you please advise advise the best option? Our train itinerary is as follows:
Many thanks for your advice.
Hi there,
For a 14 day rail pass to be economical, you have to aim to spend more than ¥45,100 on individual train tickets.
Lets take a look at the costs of the pieces of your itinerary:
TOTAL: ¥57740 for 6 legs
As the total cost of separate tickets is more than the cost of a 14 day rail pass, I certainly recommend you use a rail pass for your trip. You should have a basic saving of around ¥12,640, and will also have the flexibility to change your travel plans should you want, or make extra day trips.
For Hakone I have used Odawara as it is the closest JR station. From here you will need to use the Odakyu rail system to get up to the lakes. I recommend using the Hakone Free Pass for this. For Koyasan, you should use the Nanlkai Dentetsu trains from Namba Osaka. We have a post with more detail on the Koyasan leg here.
Hope this helps!
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