Japan family holiday - travel agency or DIY?

[bottersnikes]

We've just started to plan a holiday to Japan for the 4 of us, probably for late 2019 / early 2020. Organised trips through agencies seem to be eye-wateringly expensive, but we're not sure if we're just out of touch, as we've not done a long-haul trip before.
Can any Mumsnetters who've done a family holiday to Japan before give me an idea of 1) our approximate budget for 2 weeks, staying in a mix of ryokan and 3* hotels (i.e. we don't need luxury, just somewhere clean and comfortable) and 2) whether we will need guides etc or can find our way around ourselves?
Our kids will be 14 and 16 by the time we go.
I'll have a good read of the other threads about Japan, too, there seem to be a few of them out there.
Thank you!

At least £4000 each. Diy is difficult and Japanese hotels are expensive. Ryokans are not cheap. The problem is that Japan doesn’t really do guest house or B and B. Also you are travelling in winter. So check the weather.

However, it’s an amazing place to visit and I would save up and do it via an knowledgeable agent. Look at magazines like Wunderlust for ideas. The train itineraries are fantastic but nothing is cheap. Direct flights are not either!

Definitely DIY! I find organized trips extortionate. Just did Singapore and Malaysian Borneo for a fraction of the costs I saw online.

We did a two week holiday to Japan 9 years ago. Children were 5 and 6. Spent about 5K all in - including spending money. Prices will have gone up a bit and it will cost more with teens but not THAT much more.

DIY is not remotely difficult. We stayed in a huge range of places. B&B/smartest hostel ever/traditional ryokan (this was the most expensive, included dinner)/modern hotel in Tokyo/heritage hotel. Travelled by train - think we bought a pass?

Not done a family holiday there, but I would highly recommend the tour company Inside Japan. They do families holidays I believe.

You can very easily get an idea of costs by looking at flights, hotel websites (booking.com, agoda) and the cost of train passes.

If you’re ambivalent about completely DIY the you could do the Inside Japan self guided tour as a compromise. They look fab.

Yes Inside Japan are great, we did our honeymoon with them in Japan.

I'm tentatively researching a trip to Japan with my older teens for next summer.
I have found some good prices at The Dragon Trip.com
I don't know anyone that has used them personally but the reviews sound promising

You can easily DIY. But watch out in hotels, some of them allow smoking in bedrooms, so make sure you ask for a non-smoking room / floor if that’s an issue for you. We didn’t think to ask, and the smell of stale smoke in one place we stayed at was absolutely disgusting.

We didn’t do a group trip. We had a bespoke trip organised for us. So self guided in effect. We were met off the plane and our train pass was sorted for us. After that, we were self guided.

I didn’t have a tight budget so we wanted the legwork done but had a big input into hotels and itinerary. That suits us best. We stayed in a brilliant (expensive and exquisite) hotel in Kyoto for 5 nights and that put the price up. Worth every penny though. We don’t like rushing about and the organised trips tend to do that and stay in faceless hotels. I wanted personal, smaller, hotels of good quality and checked all the travel web sites to check them out. The travel company largely came up with excellent itinerary suggestions but we tweaked it to allow more time in Kyoto. Many tours only see a few highlights but it is a city full of highlights. We also did a cookery course and saw a Geiko/Maiko show so several extras added in. It was one of our best holidays.

I think £5000 for 2 weeks will barely get you the flights now for 4 unless you use some back street airline with 3 stop overs. Add in the rail passes and you have spent quite a lot. However if depends what you and your teens would be prepared to put up with regarding flights and hotels.

Summer in Japan is also very hot and humid so be prepared for that. May was hot enough for us!

I have visited Japan several times and always diy - researched using trip advisor and lonely planet. We stayed in a traditional Japanese house in Kyoto which I found using flip key (part of the trip advisor website) Much cheaper than a hotel.

We did DIY but had a friend with local knowledge. We used a site dedicated to Japanese Ryoken and the train. The most excellent holiday.

We are also planning a two week DIY trip to Japan next year. I've booked flights and hotels so far. Took a lot of research online and pouring over maps of Tokyo and Kyoto to work out where Hotels were and proximity to attractions and transport. I did a bit at a time and quite enjoyed it - know a lot more about Japan now! So far cost is up to £4000 for flights and approx 4300 for (reasonably good ) hotels through agado.com. Rail passes and trips on top will take total cost over £10000 but we are three adults and a teenager requiring two rooms in hotels. Good Luck x

If you are willing to do one quick change then perfectly respectable European airlines such as Air France, KLM, Swiss Air do plenty of return flights for about £600 or even less. I don't know how flexible your dates are though - that obviously makes a big difference,

A quick browse on Booking.com shows you can easily get nice (but fairly simple) rooms/apartments for 4 people for under £110-£150 a night depending on where. Rail pass is expensive at £300 each. I think a good trip for 4 people for £8000 is realistic. Much less than that and you are getting towards backpacker levels.

Easy enough to do diy. They’re putting a fair bit of effort into improving accessibility for foreigners due to the olympics. Costs are comparable to the UK for many things. Basic hotels are reasonably priced - Japanese chains can be cheaper than international chains, if a little soulless. Try sites such as toyoko inn, mystays and dormy inn.

Be wary of air b&b there due to the legal position. Might be fine by the time you go though.

A two week holiday will take at least 30 hours of research and planning and booking, so make your own decision on how much that 30 hours would cost compared to oursourcing it :)
We did an own-planned trip earlier this year, first visit to Japan, same 3*/ryuken base, and we loved almost every minute of it.

Rooms will be at least £150/night - at least where we chose them walking distance from the railway station and sights (Tokyo, Kyoto, Nara). Flights were £700/head. Food can be cheap as chips - ramen bars are fantastic at ~£6/head for so much food - or as complicated and expensive as you like. There are almost no takeaways but you can get good home-heating food at 7-11 and similar for a few quid a bowl.

Allow at least three nights in any place to give yourself enough time to see things.

Cost up your rail trips before you buy a global pass - for our trip it was half the price to just get tickets (navigating the ticket machines can be awfully confusing, the ticket desk people are wonderful though), and we used the top-end shinkansen which the pass wouldn't give either. www.japan-guide.com/railpass/ for that - and in fact that whole site is fabulously useful.

As are the people when you're there - if you stand around looking lost it's quite likely someone will ask if you're ok, particularly on subways. Only caveat is that DCs need to be pretty dang well behaved and quiet or you will get looks. No other repercussions apart from the embarassment, they're too polite to toss you out!

spoonblender is right. You will have to balance what you would pay to having it arranged for you against the (long) time it will take to do yourself.
We loved our 3 weeks holiday and arranged it ourself but we did come unstuck on the last week, which we had left unplanned, thinking we could book as we went. It just doesn't work in Japan.
As others have said, make sure you get the rail pass.
Have a great time.
I would recommend doing the Post Walk. Forgotten what it's called, but others will know. Stay at matsumoto, take the train to the starting point and it's a pleasant day'so walk through old post towns. Very easy to organise for yourself.
We also spent a few days walking pilgrimage routes on the Kii peninsula, which great. Quite a lot of organising in advance, but we'll worth it.
We did find that we got shrine and temple fatigue, so it's worth factoring in other sights.

Also, don't forget that, when you stay in a traditional ryokan there is nowhere to comfortably sit and relax in the room (at least in our experience) and few places to just sit and relax outside. Tea and coffee are really expensive. So evenings are dull (unless you're in the bigger cities)

This is really helpful, thank you!
We feel more confident now that we can put together a holiday ourselves as we don't mind putting in a few weekends of planning.

Arigatou gozaimasu!

Our rail pass did include Shinkansen. That’s run by Japan Rail. Are there two pricing points? What it didn’t include was the Private lines such as the Enoden line.

Also you can send bags in advance to your next hotel. They leave at about 5pm and you just keep an overnight bag and take it with you the next day. Luggage storage on trains is limited. Time to get on the trains is limited! Again, it’s another expense but worth it. I cannot remember meeting anyone British in the 13 days we were there.

We stayed in Tsumago and walked the post route from Magome. The Ryokans in Tsumago are great. I think you wouldn’t want to stay in one everywhere. Tatami mats and futons - no chairs! Try an onsen resort if you can.

With long haul it’s ajeays cost vs time saved. Air travel stops and diy helps save money. I’d rather pay though. The loos in the hotels are amazing! All that choice!

yes - just wait until you see the toilets! I 1st came across one in Tokyo airport, extremely tired, a real wtf moment

do you remember the pillows in the ryokans bubbles?

Reading this with great interest.
We are hoping to go with 3 teens in a year or two. Will have to do it on a relative budget, so will be DIY ing it!
It sounds like such an interesting place.

When you say about the toilets.... in a good way?!