Narita Airport is the gateway to the nation’s capital – Tokyo. The side  locates about 60 km northeast of  the central Tokyo and relatively far.

There are several options to get to the central Tokyo from Narita Airport, by train (JR Line or Keisei Line) or by limousine bus. Of course it depends on what time will you take the trains (or buses) and which place in Tokyo will you leave for, but usually the fastest way is by Narita Express (JR Line) and it takes about 60 min. and costs 2,940yen. 

(If you want to know the best way to get there, please use the route finder service on the internet. http://www.hyperdia.com/en/ )

Today Keisei Line announced that they would launch new train service, connecting Narita airport and the central Tokyo (UENO station) in 36 min., which would shorten the current travel hour in about half. The ticket will be 2400yen.  That’s a good news, maybe. New train service will start in July 2010.

As we’ve informed already, now we have original T-shirts for sale.

Some of our tour guests have purchased them for souvenirs. Thank you!!

 It is available at 3,000 yen now!!  (orignal price is 3,500yen)

 We have 3 sizes, Men’s XL, L and M.

 The material of the shirts is fast dry 100% Polyester, and the brand of the shirts is Jack Wolfskin.

At the left side of the back, our Logo is printed vertically and on the right shoulder, our course map is printed.

Maybe one of the most popular places to visit in Tokyo, Tsukiji market has just announced that they will temporarily suspend for visitors to visit Tuna auction area same as last year from December 10 to January 23.

As this period is the busiest time and most crowded time in the year, and  visitors might be an obstacle  for their business. 

Please be noted!

It situated in the northwestern part of Tokyo, and it takes about three hours by car or by Shinkansen (bullet train) from Tokyo, Tsubame Onsen (Hot Spring) in Myoko highland of Niigata prefecture is now at the height of the fall foliage. There are eight small Onsen Ryokans (Japanese inns with hot spring) scattered on the either side of several tens of meters steep hill on the mountainsides of 1,100 meters high.

    Tsubame  Onsen is a famous place as a colony of martin, and “Tsubame” is a martin (a kind of swallow) in Japanese. When I were there, I saw nests of  martins lined along the eaves. As martins has already grown and left the nests, all of the nests were empty at that time.

    The hot spring was sulfur bath with milky white colour. At the edge of the town (in the middle of above photo) there is free of charge outdoor hot spring along the mountain stream.  It was full of visitors who came here to enjoy the colourful autumn leaves.

      Yes, now is the best time for the autumn leaves. The outdoor hot spring will be closed during winter.

    MASA

The last tour in 2009       December 27 (Sunday)

The first tour in 2010      January 9  (Saturday)

No tour is scheduled on January 12 (Tuesday) and 14 (Thursday)

Thank you for your understanding!

Thanks to our many guests who have commented and given a wonderful reviews on various  travel sites, we have recently seen a big jump in the number of guests than ever before. At the same time we have been receiving  more requests for weekday tours forquite some time.

And now ladies and gentlmen, we are happy to announce the start of our weekday tours from October! We will run the tours twice a week, Route A (Tokyo Bay Ride) on Tuesdays and Route B (Sumo Wrestler’s Ride) on Thursdays.  Those of you who are only staying in Tokyo during the week, these tours are for you! We hope to see you then!

We are sometime asked by our guests if we don’t have any original items for sale. Finally, we have one item  -our very own  TGCT T-Shirt.

A fast-dry sport shirt from Jack Wolfskin , with our logo on the back and our route map on the right hand shoulder.

We have three sizes, M, L and XL, at 3,500yen.

We operated the route B  (Sumo Wrestler’s Ride) tour today, with our always nice and cheerful guests. We made a extra stop at Atago Shrine (usually only on route A-Tokyo Bay Ride) as today was the day of the biennial festival.

The “Shusse no Kaidan Matsuri (Steps to Success Festival)” is based on a famous legend going back some four hundred years. (If you are interestetd in this legend, please join our bike tour!! )

High-spirited men carrying a portable shrine down the steps calling out ” Wa-Shoi” in a very loud voice. It’s quite exciting to watch. We were really lucky that we caught the event just in time today !

I Recently visited  Houshi Onsen in Gunma Prefecture, two hours away from  central Tokyo by car. This was the view I enjoyed from my room, pictureque main building of this Onsen Ryokan and beyond the river is the roof of the new annex ward. Shortly after breakfast in my room, it seemed that I had happily fallen back to sleep.

I have known the father and the son who are the owners of this Onsen Ryokan for long time, and we had a pleasant time over quite a bit of nice Sake the  night before. That’s why I remembered only half of what we had talked about, even though we had  a lot of  “fruitful” discussions. Too bad I can’t  share this with you here…

Cheers, that’s all for now.

Masa

Hello, again.  After I left the Netherlands, I visited Norway. It’s another lovely place to cycle. I had heard about Rallarvegen – the former construction road for Bergen Railway from our tour guest, so cycling here  is what I had been looking forward the most this time.

Rallarvegen was absolutely superb! It’ was like a fairyland. This is a must do ride!!