Golden Week With Kids: Quieter Areas That Skip the Crowds

For a family trip during Golden Week, Japan's run of national holidays from late April into early May, your choice of destination decides how tired everyone ends up. Head straight for the famous crowd-pullers and you meet traffic jams, long lines and no vacancies all at once, and the parents give out before the children do. That is exactly why Golden Week rewards thinking in terms of quieter alternatives.

There are two angles worth taking. One is the snow country and highland areas that were the stars of winter. With the ski season over, Golden Week falls into a lull between travel seasons, and the same hotel can be noticeably easier to book. The other is to spend several nights at a large resort where the whole day happens on site, so you sidestep the crowded sights altogether. At a hotel with a pool, a play area and a buffet, children are perfectly happy without ever sitting in traffic.

This collection gathers the areas that lend themselves to that way of thinking. Crowds and availability during Golden Week change from year to year, so treat this as a guide to the general pattern, and check the verified facilities on the hotel page and the availability on the booking sites early for any property that catches your eye.