7D Autumn Road Trip (Nagano, Niigata, etc.)
In Japan, October and November is the time for fall foliage, autumn food (chestnut, pacific saury, rice, etc.), the sea of clouds phenomenon and hot spring. For my early November trip to Japan this year, I decided to do a road trip mainly covering the Koshin'etsu (Nagano and Niigata prefectures) and Southern Tohoku (Yamagata and Miyagi prefectures) regions, because the autumn colors at these regions would be at their peak. We were thankful that the places we decided to go to were not affected by Typhoon Hagibis which struck 2 weeks before our trip. However, some of the mountain roads were undergoing works due to landslides, so traffic was slower due to the merging of lanes at some parts of the journey, especially in Nagano prefecture（長野県）. We rented a car from Tokyo for 7 days and paid for the Japan Expressway Pass (20,400 yen). Considering that the toll fees incurred was around 35,000 yen, the pass provided around 40% savings. Day 1: Haneda Airport to Shirahone Hot S...