Is 12 days enough for a first trip to Japan?

Yes — provided you stop trying to see everything. Twelve days is comfortably enough for a first trip to Japan if the route is built around fewer places and longer stays. It is not enough to run the full length of the country, and any itinerary that promises you Kyushu, Kyoto, the Alps, Fuji, Tokyo and Hokkaido in twelve days is selling you train windows.

The better trade is depth. Start in Kyoto rather than Tokyo, spend real time in the quieter middle of the country, and finish in the capital.

In short

• Twelve days works if you accept fewer bases and fewer moves
• Starting in Kyoto avoids a jet-lagged first morning in Tokyo
• You gain time in places most first trips skip entirely — Kanazawa, Fukui, Lake Biwa
• You give up the far south (Hiroshima, Miyajima) and the far north
• A maximum of 12 travellers, and a free day built into Tokyo

Our Japan Undiscovered route uses the fortnight-minus-two shape deliberately. It opens with three days in Kyoto — enough to get past the two or three famous temples and into the city's ordinary streets — and then heads somewhere most first-time itineraries never go.

Lake Biwa and Nagahama, then the mountain temples of Fukui. The thatched Gassho-zukuri farmhouses of Ainokura. Two days in Kanazawa, with its samurai quarter and one of the finest gardens in Japan, and a night with a host family in rural Shinano.

Only then does it reach Tokyo, with three days including a free day you can spend as you like — or use for an excursion to Hakone and the hot springs beneath Mount Fuji.

It is a quieter Japan than the classic route, and for many travellers a more memorable one.

Honestly: the south, and the north.

Hiroshima and Miyajima are not on a twelve-day route from Kyoto. For some travellers that is the deciding factor — the Peace Park is one of the most affecting places in the country, and if it matters to you, you want the fourteen-day itinerary instead. Nara and its monks likewise sit on the longer route.

You also give up the sense of having travelled the length of Japan. The twelve-day route covers central Honshu; the fourteen-day route runs from Kyushu in the south all the way to Tokyo.

What you gain in exchange is fewer hotel changes, shorter travelling days and more hours in each place. Which of those two trades is right is a genuine question, not a sales one.

In our experience, three sorts of traveller.

Those who dislike constant repacking. Fewer bases means fewer mornings spent putting a suitcase back together.

Those who can only get twelve days. If you are still working, or fitting a trip between other commitments, twelve days is a real constraint and it is better to travel well within it than to squeeze fourteen days of route into twelve.

Those coming back to Japan. If you have already done Tokyo, Kyoto and Hiroshima, this route is largely new ground.

It suits less well anyone whose mental picture of Japan is built around Hiroshima, or who wants the full south-to-north sweep of a first grand tour.

You fly into Kansai for Kyoto and home from Tokyo, which is straightforward from the UK and avoids doubling back.

Cities are linked by train rather than coach. Sightseeing days involve several hours on your feet, with steps at temples and stations — we have set out what that really means in how much walking is there on a Japan tour.

The tour is land-only, so you book the flights that suit you; we publish recommended routes and timings. It runs on guaranteed departures, so it goes ahead regardless of numbers, with a maximum of 12 travellers.

A simple way to decide.

Choose Japan Undiscovered (twelve days) if you want fewer moves, quieter places, and time to sit still in Kyoto and Kanazawa.

Choose Japan Essentials (fourteen days) if this is your one trip to Japan and you want Hiroshima, Miyajima, Nara and Mount Fuji alongside Kyoto and Tokyo. Our two weeks in Japan itinerary sets that route out day by day.

Choose Golden Route Plus (twenty days) if you would rather not choose at all.

Still weighing it up? Tell a Japan specialist how many days you have and what you would most regret missing — that conversation usually settles it in ten minutes.