Forum - View topicTours of Japan
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Correl
 Posts: 42 Location: Redmond, WA |
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Hey all,
I'm thinking about taking a trip by myself to Japan this year. This will be my first time going to Japan, so I'm trying to figure out plan for my trip. I'll probably be staying there for 2 - 3 weeks, and I was thinking of trying to find a tour group or guided tour about 1 1/2 weeks of that. I'd appreciate any advice people can give about planning for a trip and recommendations for good tours to do while in Japan. I'd like to do a anime-centric tour if possible. Thanks |
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ManOfRust
 Posts: 1935 Location: Seattle, WA |
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I have found this website useful when I have planned past trips to Japan. In fact, I'm leaving this Thursday for a 2 week trip, and I've printed out some of the stuff from the japan-guide website to take with me.
Another site that I use to help plan things is hyperdia.com, which is great to help plan train travel. It's not as necessary if you are just going to stay in Tokyo the whole time, but if you are planning on doing much traveling around it's a great resource. I find it to be particularly helpful if I'm planning on visiting someplace that's more off the beaten path since there isn't frequent train service to some places. I don't know about guided tours since I generally avoid them, but that's more because of how I like to travel as opposed to any problem with tours. I guess the only other suggestion I would have is that while there's certainly nothing wrong with doing an anime-focused trip, Japan is a beautiful country with a rich history and there is a lot of fantastic non-anime stuff to do and see while you are there. You'll miss out on some amazing things if you keep too narrow of a focus on just anime related activities. |
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GATSU
Posts: 15672 |
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Tempest
 I Run this place.ANN Publisher  Posts: 10471 Location: Do not message me for support. |
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PopJapanTravel is closed.
Evan Miller, who used to help run PJT (and was before that an employee at ANN) has started his own tour group called PacSetTours. http://www.pacsettours.com Evan's a super competent tour guide and really knows how to make his guests get the most out of Japan. He also does a concierge service for people who are traveling alone. Something I've taken advantage of on several of my vacations to Japan. You could join one of Evan's tours fora portion of your trip and have him help you organize the rest of it as well. He'll set up hotels for you, recommend self-guided tours and provide maps, give you trains schedules, and even help you out over the phone if / when you need help in Japan. |
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Joji5
Posts: 4 |
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You may have gone to Japan already but the best time of the year to go with respect to weather is May and October. Rainy season start in June and it is hot and humid from July to September.
If you plan on traveling, get a Japan Rail Pass. IACE Travel or JTB can arrange for the pass before you go. You can't get them there. It is cheaper to say in a business hotels like Toyoko Inn. October is the traditional month were all the gods to go Izumo Taisho. Akiba is still the center of Otaku but there are other areas in Tokyo as Nakano and Ikebukuro. You may want to look over www.wa-pedia.com Enjoy. |
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Correl
Posts: 42 Location: Redmond, WA |
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As a follow up, based on the suggestions from the thread, I've signed up for www.pacsettours.com spring anime tour. Looking forward to it
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kaemiko chan
 Posts: 5 |
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Hi Correl, I just find your post and how's your last year's journey in Japan ? I'm preparing my tour too, so do you have any suggestion after your trip ? Thanks alot 
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guildmaster
 Posts: 364 Location: Hot & Humid FL |
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If I ever get out that way again, I want to go see where my old (new when i bought it) Miata was made.
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CosmicRage
Posts: 34 Location: SoDak |
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I've traveled with pacset before, Evan is a great tour guide. He handled a tour extension for me and a friend and we had directions and tickets to everything we needed. Very awesome trip, have a safe trip!
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Brent Allison
 Posts: 2445 Location: Athens-Clarke County, GA, USA |
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For what it's worth, I'm writing up a proposal for 8-10 education students to do a study abroad in Japan for a short May session. Since they're education students, they have to have a field experience that involves working with children and youth ages birth to 18. If anyone knows of a school in Japan that's rail-accessible and would like 20 hours worth of free labor from American college students teaching English (albeit probably the conversational kind) in May 2014, drop me a PM.
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GeminiDS85
Posts: 391 |
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Using connections through your university is probably going to be your best option, but if you are unable to gather any interest that way, you might want to try sending e-mails to private companies and offering your services.
First off, I would contact the Jet Program and try to arrange something with them. http://www.jetprogramme.org/j/ This website is also very useful for finding information about teaching overseas. http://www.eslcafe.com/ This is one of the largest private companies in Japan that provides English language tutoring. http://www.eccjr.co.jp/ There is a company that does English language camps for Japanese students that might be worth checking out, but at the moment I can’t remember the name of the company. If this is an option you want to pursue, just let me know and I’ll contact someone who does have that information. |
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Brent Allison
Posts: 2445 Location: Athens-Clarke County, GA, USA |
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My university has no links to Japan, so it's all on me to make this happen. I'll take whatever info I can get, so a short language camp sounds like it might be a good fit. I've contacted a company called BorderLink that might help me out. Any knowledge about them?
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GeminiDS85
Posts: 391 |
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Turns out the camp I was thinking of is organized through the Jet Program and not a private company.
I’ve never had any experience with them. The website I posted above called Dave’s ESL Café has a forum that is dedicated to just Japan, so you might want to try making a post there and see if someone more knowledgeable than me is willing to assist you. Also, you might want to try contacting Japanese universities directly and offering your services. If you decide to go with this route, you would probably have a better chance if you contacted universities that don’t cater to international students. Ideally, you should be looking for an organization that will at least pay for the room and board of you and your student teachers, but don’t expect too much besides that. Good luck
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