Fukuoka – Busan

The Japanese islands have been linked by ferries for well over 100 years. There are over 100 islands that make up the country, at one time or another they have been a part of the ferry network.
A brief history.
In the last 10-15 years the expansion of the Shiskansen and major rail network as well as the de-regulation of the air industry ave seen a great rationalisation of ferry services. Almost all international travel is now by air.
Fukuoka is one of the major ports, with ships to China, Taiwan & Korea

Hakata Station is about 3km from the international Ferry terminal, departure point for all ferries to Korea.

BUSAN PORT

Has its own site with links top services.

Busan – Fukuoka (Hakata)

Beetle 2,3 | Hydrofoil | Korea Marine Express | 2h55m | ¥13000 | 0845 (1) … 1725(6)

Kobee 3,5 | Hydrofoil | Mirejet | 2h55m | | Mixed operation with Beetle

New kamelriah | Ro-Ro | Korea Marine Express | 5h30m | KRW 80000 up to KRW 180000 | 1230(Fukuoka)->1800(Busan)/2230 (Busan) -> 0630

The korean island of Geoje is also served by a large number of ferries from the Busan coast ferry port at the adjacent pier.

A subway line is 1 block away.

Busan KTX station is only 2 stops away.

Bye Bye Japan

What distinguishes it from the rest of Asia and even most of the world is that JR almost exclusively use EMU or DMU’s. Even over the past 12 months they have decreased the number of loco hauled overnight services.

If you travel on the cheapest trains, don’t expect comfort. They are not designed for someone who wants to take a 200km cross country journey.

Local and rapid trains are 3-4 doors per car. With most carriages being around 20m long they have either bench seating or back to back  seats. You would normally find this design on metro’s, no more than 5-10km for an average  journey. In Japan you can find these cars all over the country on routes of anything from 10km to 200km. In outer-urban and regional areas they often relegate the older stock from the urban areas, or sometime old super-express stock.

Super-Express trains and above offer standard 2 door 2+2 or 2+1 reclining seating, stopping patterns are around 10-20km between stations. They are also have the most interesting colour schemes and designs. Some might even call them ugly, I like to think of them as ugly in the same way they called the Sydney Opera House ugly, they are a little unique for mass acceptance.

It is rare to find dining cars on these trains, some trips that run more than a couple of hours have trolley services to the seats.

JR news shows quite a few interesting projects and expansions planned.

Japan 4

5 days from Wakkanai to

Aoromi to Tokyo

You can go from Aoromi to Tokyo by local trains (cheapest) in…

Fastest: 17hrs. | 750km | 11000 yen (approx) | 14 yen/km or 45km/h | about 10 changes

in reality you want to take that as a 4 day trip, no more than 3-4 trains a day

Day 6 to Akita, Day 7 to Fukushima, Day 8 to Maebashi, Day 9 to Tokyo

Day 10 and 11 in Tokyo

Tokyo to Osaka

Fastest: 11 hrs | 600 km | 9000 yen | 15 yen/km or 54 km/h | about 9 changes

3 day trip

Day 12 Tokyo to Iwata, 6hrs 288km

Day 13 Iwata to Osaka,6hrs 310km

Day 14 and 15 in Osaka

Osaka to Fukuoka

Fastest: 7 hrs | 320 km | 5000 yen | 15 yen/km or 45 km/h | 3 or 4 changes

3 day trip (slow via west coast)

Day 16 Osaka to Tottori, 5 hrs (220km)

Day 17 Tottori to Hiroshima, 6hrs (303km)

Day 18 in Hiroshima

Day 19 to Hiroshima – Fukuoka (6 hrs/300-400km)

Day 20 in Fukuoka

Japan Day 21 to Korea!

for comparison

Tokyo to Hakata

on the Hayabusa overnight train

d1803 Tokyo

a1010 Hakata (16hrs)

total cost: 23040 yen, 2nd class single sleeper, 1175km

on Nozomi Shinkansen

d0600 Tokyo

a1118 Hakata (4hrs)

total cost: 22320, 1175 km

As always the cheapest way is to get a sleeper, given the cost of accommodation.

Japan 3

Waiting for wordpress to load……..loading……

At 1440 x 900 my screen is full of widgets.

Content goes for 5 lines (sigh).

I still have to code my tables.

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| Timetables easier in a wiki |
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Japan attempt 2

Its very hard to choose a path when the whole country is essentially one big suburban rail system.

Departing from the previous entries I might look at the cheap rail passes (local trips) and break down the trip into…

North -> Tokyo

Tokyo Trips

Tokyo -> Osaka

Osaka ->Fukuoka

Useful information on Japan Rail passes can be found online. There are many more on each JR company site.

Useful passes (JR):

JR Rail Pass, 7 Days, 283000 Yen

JR Seishun 18 Kippu, 5 non-consecitive days in School Holidays, 115000 Yen, Local Trains Only

JR Hokkaido & Higashininhon Pass, 5 Consecutive Days in School Holidays, 100000 – 95000 Yen, Local Trains Only & Interisland Line, Hokkaido -> Tokyo

Yamagata – Wakamatsu

BY distance a short hop across a mountain of about 100km. In reality this trip seems to take most of the day (9 hrs). Even taking Shiskansen takes the journey down to 4 hours.

The final jump from Yonezawa to Wakamatsu is covered by numerous health spa’s and ski resorts. However the links between the two areas are minimal. No rail lines cross the mountains, and the bus services only seem to flow down to local centers, not across the ranges. You can take the railway down to Fukushima, quite a large city.

I have a suspicion that this timetable links Yonezawa station with Kitakata Station. Although the translation services dont know what to make of it.

On further invesitgation i found the destination of the bus to be http://www.vivi.ne.jp/shirabu_kanko/. Which is (again based on educated guess and the PDF map) the town of Takayu on the Northern side of the mountain, approx 17km by road

Akita – Yamagata

Continuing down the middle of the country. It is a little slow going.

09:43			KAKUNODATE
	%	20min	JR Tazawako Line
23min	10:03 10:26	35km	OMAGARI(AKITA)
	%	17min	JR Ou Line
56min	10:43 11:39	55km	YOKOTE	¥2940
	%	85min	JR Ou Line
75min	13:04 14:19	135km	SHINJO
	%	67min	JR Ou Line
	15:26	196km	YAMAGATA

Slow but an interesting route.

Yamagata is the middle of on of Japans Ski areas, so there are lots of places to stay. My aim is to get as close as I can to Wakamatsu as I can. Yonezawa is one option, around 1 hr further along the line south in the mountains. Alternately you can head east to the major centers of Sendai and head south to Fukushima.

I guess it comes back to the question, how much regional travel vs how much local travel do you want to do. For the sake of sanity 3pm is a reasonable time to finish. It allows for breaking the journey at any intermediate stop with at least 3 hrs of daylight to play with.

Aomori – Akita

East or West, cant decdie, this graphic shows some of the options to travel out of Aormori

On second thought, it doesnt really show alot, I was just playing in Inkscape, thought it looked cool. The dotted lines are other train lines. The caligraphy shows the two main lines out of Aomori. That heavy dashed line is the scenic detour. There are so many routes cross crossing the country I cant decide what to do. I might post a West Coast/East Coast/Mountain Route from Aormori to Tokyo

Taking the very scenic coastal route.

AOMORI 0738

KAWABE 0817 640M

KAWABE 0903

HIGASHINOSHIRO 1213 8522D

The problem or advantage is that there is so much choice with getting around Japan. You can travel across and around the country without ever crossing or backtracking. The other interesting thing is that almost all the companies are privately owned. While JR run most of the buses and rail in the country quite a number of prefectures have either local government run or privately run operations. East of Higashinoshiro is Takanosu where you can get the Akita inland railway.

HIGASHINOSHIRO 1223

TAKANOSU(JR) 1247 647M

Walk to the next station

Yoshi Mori Express…or local train

TAKANOSU 1401 1511

KAKUNODATE 1601 1742

Hakodate – Aomori

The seikan tunnel. There are only 11 trains a day, all Limited Expresses. You can arrange to visit the underwater station of Tappikaitei, southbound the times are:

Hakodate 1040

Tappikaitei 1149

Tappikaitei 1359

Aomori 1445

There are only 2 trains a day that make the stop at the Tappikaitei tunnel station.

At 100m below sea level it is one of the worlds deepest stations.

Aomori was the end of the line before the tunnel openeed. A ferry still stands as a permanent museum.

Sapporo – Hakodate

Trains are not a popular for of transport for this journey, mainly due to the fact that you have to change train 3 times to travel via the Seikan tunnel.

Sapporo is the capital. Traveling onwards you can go east or west, again the slow train west on the Chitose Line

0913 SAPPORO (or any 15 mins up to 1130) 3853M

0958 OTARU 34km

change to the Muroran Line

1220 OTARU 2940D (5 trains a day)

1521 OSHAMAMBE +140km 2940D

and again to the Hakodate Main Line

1616 OSHAMAMBE 2846D (6 trains a day)

1734 MORI +63km 2846D

1940 MORI (5 trains a day)

2020 ONUMA +22km 822D (15 trains a day)

2107 HAKODATE +50km

Kind of a late arrival and a big trip, alternately I could break the trip at Oshamambe.

0806 OSHAMAMBE

0905 MORI 68km 3820D

1121 MORI

1201 ONUMA 3824D

1237 HAKODATE +50km

In fact you can set out and hop on and off trains all day along these routes as they carries quite a bit of traffic, being the main line from Sapporo to the mainland.

Local train rollingstock seems to be the JNR 700 series, either the 711, 721 or 731 series EMU

The  785 & 789 series are reserved for the limited express servicves.

781, with its distinct raised cab, once was the limited express, is now more and more relegated to local services.

JR Hokkaido also run numerous DMU services further away from Sapporo