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Hakone Day Trip from Shinjuku by Romancecar: Which Ticket to Buy, and the Loop That Works with Kids

A Hakone day trip from Shinjuku for families with kids of different ages: which ticket to buy, where to board, and how to loop around without backtracking. All prices checked 13 September 2026.

Who this route is for

  • Families travelling by train only, with a baby or toddler, an elementary-age child and a teenager in the same group.
  • People trying to decide whether the Hakone Freepass is worth it for a single day. There is no 1-day version, only 2-day and 3-day. We do the arithmetic below.
  • People who want to see Owakudani and Lake Ashi and return to Hakone-Yumoto without riding the same line twice.

This route is not a good fit if your youngest child still needs a long nap in a bed at a set time, or if you want to spend the whole day in one hot-spring town. In that case, stay in Hakone-Yumoto and skip the pass entirely.

Where you board, and what you must buy before you go

Two separate purchases are involved, and confusing them is the single most common mistake.

What Details (checked 13 Sep 2026)
Romancecar limited express seat Shinjuku to Hakone-Yumoto. Limited express charge 1,200 yen at a counter/machine, 1,150 yen ticketless. Children pay half the adult charge, rounded up to the nearest 10 yen.
Seat rules All Romancecar seats are reserved. You must hold a limited express ticket before boarding. Reservations can be made up to 45 minutes before departure.
Where to board Odakyu Shinjuku Station. This is not the JR Shinjuku platforms — allow extra time to walk across if you arrive by JR.
Hakone Freepass From Shinjuku: 7,100 yen adult / 1,600 yen child for 2 days; 7,500 yen / 1,850 yen for 3 days. The limited express charge is not included.
Where to buy the pass Ticket machines and counters at all Odakyu Line stations, Odakyu Travel centres, Seven-Eleven, station buildings around Hakone, and some travel agents. On sale from one month before travel; ticket machines only sell passes valid from the same day.

Deciding to ride the Romancecar and deciding to buy the Freepass are two unrelated decisions. The limited express charge is the same either way, so leave it out when you compare ticket options.

Is the Freepass worth it for one day? The arithmetic

The Hakone Freepass covers eight modes of transport: the Hakone Tozan Line, Hakone Tozan Bus (designated sections), the Hakone Tozan Cable Car, the Hakone Ropeway, the Hakone Sightseeing Cruise (pirate ship), Odakyu Highway Bus (designated sections), Tokai Bus (designated sections), and the Hakone Sightseeing Facility Loop Bus.

Here is what the same loop costs if you pay for each leg separately. Adult, IC card fares.

Leg Mode Adult (IC)
Shinjuku to Hakone-Yumoto Odakyu Line 1,261 yen
Hakone-Yumoto to Gora Hakone Tozan Railway Through fare not confirmed on an official page; excluded from the total below
Gora to Sounzan Cable car 430 yen
Sounzan to Togendai Ropeway (one way) 2,000 yen
Togendai-ko to Motohakone-ko Sightseeing cruise (one way) 1,700 yen
Motohakone-ko to Hakone-Yumoto Hakone Tozan Bus 1,210 yen
Hakone-Yumoto to Shinjuku Odakyu Line 1,261 yen
Total (railway leg excluded) 7,862 yen

We counted the Tozan Railway leg as zero because we could not confirm its through fare on an official page, so the real figure is higher than 7,862 yen. Even so, it already exceeds the 7,100 yen pass by 762 yen.

Do the full loop: buy the pass, even for one day. Stop at Hakone-Yumoto only: round-trip Odakyu fare is 2,522 yen, so the pass would waste 4,578 yen.

Children make the pass win more easily

The child pass is 1,600 yen against 7,100 yen for an adult — about one quarter. Ordinary Japanese child fares are half the adult fare, so the more children in your group, the more the pass tips in your favour. In Japan, “child” fares generally apply to elementary-school age; teenagers from junior high school upward normally pay the adult fare. Check the exact age brackets on the purchase screen, because they differ between the Odakyu Line, the ropeway and the cruise.

The day, hour by hour

Times below are estimates built from each operator’s published journey times. Check the actual departure times on the day — the cruise and the bus run far less often than the trains.

Approx. time What you do Published journey time
08:00 Romancecar departs Odakyu Shinjuku Morning departures from 07:00 onward, 1–2 per hour
09:15 Arrive Hakone-Yumoto; change to the Tozan Railway 75 minutes at fastest from Shinjuku
09:30–10:10 Tozan Railway to Gora 8.9 km in about 40 minutes, with switchbacks
10:20–10:30 Cable car to Sounzan 1.2 km, 209 m of height, about 10 minutes
10:40–10:50 Ropeway to Owakudani About 10 minutes per section, cabins about every minute
10:50–11:50 Owakudani, 60 minutes. Viewing decks and black eggs Black eggs sold 09:00–16:40
11:50–12:00 Ropeway to Togendai About 10 minutes
12:10–12:40 Sightseeing cruise to Motohakone-ko About 25–40 minutes from Togendai-ko
12:45–13:30 Lunch, 45 minutes, near Motohakone port —
13:30–14:30 Onshi-Hakone Park, 60 minutes (free) Lakeside Observation Building open 09:00–16:30
14:40 Hakone Tozan Bus from Motohakone-ko to Hakone-Yumoto Journey time not published on an official page — check on the day
15:40–17:30 Hakone-Yumoto, 110 minutes. Day-use hot spring or the shopping street Hakone Yuryo open to 20:00 weekdays / 21:00 weekends
17:30–18:00 Romancecar back to Shinjuku Evening departures listed up to 18:00, 1–2 per hour

The design idea: front-load the transport, back-load the walking and resting. If the morning slips, cut the Hakone-Yumoto block, not the park. Changing a reserved limited express seat is far more trouble than shortening a hot-spring stop.

What each age group gets out of it

Baby or toddler

The hard part is not the walking, it is the number of changes: five separate vehicles in one day. Each change means getting a stroller on and off. We could not confirm stroller policies for the cable car, ropeway or cruise on official pages, so assume you may be asked to fold it and pack accordingly — a carrier is the safer default for the mountain section.

The reliable nap window on this route is the cruise: 25–40 minutes seated, indoors if you stay in the cabin. The reliable indoor toilet stop is the Lakeside Observation Building at Onshi-Hakone Park: there is a barrier-free toilet on the ground floor and a baby-changing shelf in the women’s toilet on the first floor. Note there is no lift in that building, so the upper-floor rest room and balcony mean stairs.

Owakudani sits in an active volcanic area where sulphurous gas is present. If anyone in your group has a respiratory condition, keep the stop short and stay on the viewing decks.

Elementary-age child

This is the age the route suits best. The vehicles themselves are the attraction — a switchback mountain railway, a cable car, a ropeway over a steaming valley, and a pirate-shaped boat, all in one morning. The black eggs at Owakudani are boiled in a hot-spring pond so the shells turn black; local lore says one egg adds seven years to your life. They are sold in packs of four for 500 yen, so plan to share.

Pay the child fare here, and keep the ticket or pass accessible — it is checked at every change.

Teenager

Teenagers generally pay adult fares in Japan from junior high school age, so budget accordingly. The part that usually lands well is Owakudani’s “Chikyu no Tani” viewing area, opened 25 April 2025, with three decks themed on “black, geo and wind”: Kaze no Wa Terrace, Ibuki no Deck and Ozora no Hotori. There is also ROPESTER, an open-air gondola running one way only between Togendai and Owakudani: 12 and over, advance reservation required, 5,000 yen — or 2,500 yen with a Hakone Freepass. If your teenager wants this, the pass decision is effectively made for you.

The part that usually lands badly is the 110 minutes in Hakone-Yumoto. Give them the shopping street rather than the bath if they would rather not undress in a communal onsen.

If you extend the trip overnight

Two Japanese conventions surprise visitors. First, many ryokan and hotels allow young children to sleep in a parent’s bedding at a reduced rate or free, but the rules are per-property and are usually stated as a number of children per adult — confirm on the property’s own page, not on a search-results screen. Second, Japanese-style rooms and many ryokan entrances require you to remove your shoes, so socks without holes and slip-on shoes make the day easier for everyone.

Money, luggage and weather

Paying

Fares above are IC-card fares. An IC card covers the Odakyu Line and the Hakone Tozan Bus, but the Freepass is a separate paper or digital product. If you buy the pass, you do not tap for covered legs — you show the pass.

Luggage

This route involves five vehicle changes and a bus. Do not attempt it with large suitcases. If you are moving between cities the same day, leave your bags in coin lockers before you start — we could not confirm locker counts or prices at Hakone-Yumoto on an official page, so have a fallback plan (a hotel front desk or a luggage service) rather than assuming a locker will be free.

When things stop running

The ropeway operates 09:00–17:00 from February to November and 09:00–16:15 from December to January. It suspends service for three reasons: rising volcanic gas concentration (judged from readings at several measuring points), bad weather including strong wind, lightning and approaching typhoons, and scheduled maintenance, during which a substitute bus runs on the closed section.

Problem What to do instead Cost effect
Ropeway closed all day Take a Hakone Tozan Bus from Gora toward Togendai or Motohakone and join the cruise there No extra cost with the Freepass
Maintenance closure Substitute bus, covered by the Freepass. Allow extra time for road traffic Time, not money. Cut the Hakone-Yumoto block
Cruise cancelled by weather Hakone Tozan Bus from Togendai toward Motohakone and Hakone-Yumoto No extra cost with the Freepass
Rain Cut Owakudani outdoors to 30 minutes; move the day-use hot spring earlier Bath admission added
Owakudani crowded Skip the egg queue, take the next cabin, spend the time at the lake instead None

Check the Hakone Navi operating-information page on the morning you leave. The loop only works because every fallback is also inside the Freepass area.

Day-use hot spring in Hakone-Yumoto

Hakone Yuryo is three minutes from Hakone-Yumoto Station by free shuttle bus. The main baths open 10:00–20:00 on weekdays (last entry 19:00) and 10:00–21:00 on weekends and holidays (last entry 20:00); open year-round apart from maintenance closures. Admission is 1,700–1,800 yen for adults (junior high school age and above) on weekdays, 2,000–2,200 yen at weekends and on holidays, and 1,000 yen for elementary-school children. Bath towel 550 yen, face towel 300 yen, yukata rental 300 yen. Private open-air rooms for 2–4 people are 10,400–15,400 yen per room for 120 minutes — this is the option if communal bathing does not work for your family.

Check these before you travel

  • Romancecar times and seat availability. All seats reserved; bookable up to 45 minutes before departure. Fix the return time first — it sets your Hakone-Yumoto window.
  • The current Freepass price. We used 7,100 yen from Odakyu’s official page (checked 13 Sep 2026). An older 6,100 yen figure still appeared on a Hakone Navi page, so confirm on the purchase screen.
  • The Hakone-Yumoto to Gora through fare, if you plan to go up and come back the same way instead of looping.
  • Motohakone-ko to Hakone-Yumoto bus times. The 1,210 yen fare is confirmed; the journey time is not published on an official page.
  • Ropeway operating status on the day, and the cruise’s seasonal timetable.
  • Owakudani Nature Trail reservations. The roughly 700 m trail is guided-entry only and requires a booking; you cannot simply walk on from the ropeway station.
  • ROPESTER availability (one way only, 12+, advance booking required).
  • Road closures. The Hakone Tokaido Old Road (Hatajuku Yamane area) is listed as closed by the Hakone Town Tourist Association (updated 30 July 2026). This route does not use it, but check if you plan to add a walk.
  • Stroller handling on the cable car, ropeway and cruise, if you are bringing one.

Sources and date checked

All prices, times and conditions above were checked on 13 September 2026 on the following official pages. Fares and timetables change; confirm before you travel.

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