Review

Maria Sandee and Carl Diaz-Parker

Best of Hokkaido and Tohoku

April 14, 2024 - April 28, 2024

We are very happy that we had a chance to participate in this tour; it was definitely worth it. A bonus was that we were able to see the lovely sakura blooming in Tokyo and in other cities as we progressed with the tour. Our tour group consisted of only 8 people and everyone got along well and everyone was punctual. We even met a couple whom we initially met when we did a Spring tour (with Samurai Tours) back in 2019! If there was one thing we would suggest modifying, it would be to make the Sayonara dinner into a \"Sayonara lunch\" while we were still in Tohoku, since neither Chiko-san nor Ogi-san were able to join us for dinner in Tokyo. Since all 3 meals were included for the last day of the tour, perhaps the \"dinner\" can just be a \"pick-your-own\" for that last evening. Thank you for a lovely trip!

Itinerary

The itinerary consisted of a variety of places that offered their own special aspect of Japan.

Lodging

The combination of \"ryokan\" and Western hotels were well-selected.

Food

The variety of dishes and selections provided were excellent.

Guides

Our Hokkaido and Tohoku guide, Chiko-san was excellent! She is knowledgeable, personable, cheerful and genuinely enthusiastic about showing us the different sites of interest. She provided us with an abbreviated schedule that made it easy to see which places we were going to each day. Our Tokyo guide Ogi-san (we requested 3 extra days in Tokyo post-tour) went above and beyond to get us tickets to the Ghibli Museum and even accompanied us to Mitaka and joined us for part of the museum tour so she can show us areas which we would have found difficult to navigate if we were by ourselves. Prior to this, she also made sure our group got to New Chitose airport on time to begin our Hokkaido/Tohoku tour. We are forever grateful to her. Lastly, our Tokyo transport guide Onda-san made sure we got from Shinagawa to Shinjuku safely, waited for us to get checked in, and helped us get a limousine bus scheduled for our trip back to the airport before she left.

Pre-Tour Handbook

The tour handbook was well-organized and detailed, but still managed to be concise.

Tour Organization

The tour organization showed how much research was done in selecting the places to be visited.

Tour Transportation

The variety of transportation we used was excellent. Each vehicle we used was clean and the drivers were polite and friendly.

Would you go on another tour operating by Samurai Tours: Yes!

Would you recommend Samurai Tours to friends or family: Yes!