our stay in Dec 2013 in former Tsuka-no-ma.

The bluish rotenburo.

https://japantravelinsights.com/shoya-no-kan/#jp-carousel-6371

Thank you so much DLi_hk. My kids will love those stores!

We have looked at both the recommendations for the restaurant and onsen. We have decided we're keen on both, and so we can make the most of our visit to the area we will now take the longer option and spend 4.5hours. Thank you.

We're planning to travel there on Monday 30 December - hopefully there won't be too many new year closures just yet. I see reservations for the restaurant are by telephone. Do you think a lunch reservation made by someone at our hotel who can speak Japanese when we arrive in Japan around 5 days earlier is sufficient, or is it better to try to email them earlier?

Open/close depends on the specific shop and restaurant in Yufuin. Most close on Dec 31 and Jan 1.

Ok, thank you ETFlyer -hopefully we will be lucky.

While 30th Dec is a Monday, beware of EOY crowds and closures.

Your plan is fine. Booking a Yufuin restaurant 5 days in advance by locals would more than suffice. The key is it's not closed for EOY.

Better reserve the JR Yufuin-no-mori express train from 1 month in advance via the JR Kyushu reservation website.

https://train.yoyaku.jrkyushu.co.jp/inbound/pc/Top

In our recent stay in Fukuoka a few weeks ago in early April, we visited the Canal city area again where it happens that the Donguri-no-mori どんぐりの森 has a shop inside. Can't help taking snaps of those cool anime characters after so many times.

https://www.instagram.com/p/C5ZtFgiBIYg/?img_index=1

Snoopy Chaya Yufuin - note that it has been relocated elsewhere when we tried to drop in again while staying in Yufuin for 2n in end Mar. In that location it's a local coffee place whose staff mentioned that it had been relocated in the direction towards Kinrin-ko. As it was very crowded and we had to run some errands we hadn't identified it.

My kids will love seeing that. We aren't visiting the Ghibli Park in Nagoya, so they will enjoy visiting the store there instead.

I see there is a cheesecake store in Yufuin - "Milch". We're crazy about cheesecake. We have had some sensational cheesecakes around Japan, and also a couple of terrible ones (the famous one in Osaka that you can buy near Dotonbori was terrible - I must write a review sometime). In other places the cheesecake was amazing.

Consider also B-speak by top Yufuin onsen ryokan Murata Sansou. Wife and I like its roll cake. Though we're not a big fan of cheesecake, its Earl Grey cheesecake is nice.

http://www.b-speak.net/en/index.html

Thank you! We will stop here too. Similar cakes to these used to be very popular in Australia, when we used to have many individually owned bakeries that were owned and operated by qualified bakers. Progressively, over 30yrs, two (poor to very average quality) franchise chains have taken over many stores, or pushed them out of the market. Now, I really only see roll cakes, of terrible quality, in our supermaket chains. We'll be very happy to be able to buy a proper roll cake again.