Tokyo/Kyoto in May (Golden Week)

[Kane]

Planning to visit in Early May-ish. I've got mixed feelings regarding Golden Week. Can anyone clarify if it would be a good or bad time to visit, and why?

Also, anyone got any idea what airfare's going to be like around that time? Got all sort of ridiculous deals happening nowish, but what should I expect?

Was a deal for a return trip at CAD$549 just recently, but was only good for travel during March. Meh.

If anyone's got any lines for cheap tix from Vancouver to Tokyo, hook me up and I'll see what I can to get you hooked up to some Spruce / Wings & Horns stuff.

K.

[Kasper]

the thing about golden week is that pretty much everyone who has an office job will get holidays and since most peoples only get public holiday (new year, golden week and obon) they usually use those time to travel. that means that price go up the roof and train and airport are insanely crowded and it can be very difficult to almost impossible to travel cheaply inside japan. cause its their only time they can get holiday, most ppl will just pay whatever to travel and price can go up like 5-fold.

if you only plan to come to tokyo, it shouldn't be a problem (shops don't close) but if you want to travel inside japan, i strongly advise against it. it'll be really hard to get train ticket and hotel and will be much much more expensive than usual. as for airfare, i just checked the site i use usually and they have ticket for 563$CDN with norhtwest and air canada is 790. here the site http://www.navitourca.com/ the site is all in japanese, but there're based in vancouver so just call if you cannot understand. they usually have the best price. back when i lived in Whistler, i bought a plane ticket to tokyo at a japanese agency downtown, but it's been 4 years and i don't really remember the name. but i know there's 2 so if you check the yellow page, you should be able to find them. price shouldn't go up to much cause it's still low season in Canada.

549$ is pretty much the cheaper you will find (i've been back and forth japan and canada quite a lot these past 4 years so i'm pretty use to shopping around for tickets). if you can, try to travel with JAL or ANA, it's a 100 times better than with any other north american company (except maybe American that is not too bad).

if you have more question, don't hesitate to ask.

just saw your tittle, again, if you plan to go to Kyoto, finding a train ticket or hotel will be pretty hard (the shinkansen usually runs at like 150% capacity during golden week). also, about hotel, i guess if you're looking at some hostel or something like that, it might be much easier than a regular hotel.

Edited by Kasper on Mar 6, 2006 at 06:04 AM

[Kane]

Awesome. Thanks a bunch for this information Kasper. I'll definately look into this and see what I can find.

I'll be travelling with a friend, and one option is to arrange it so that we arrive maybe on the last day of Golden Week. I'll see what happens.

If I do have any other questions, I'll post!

[englandmj7]

Check Mobissimo.com too, best travel site there is; it searches every travel-bot as well as airline homepages........also get the Frommer's guide to Japan, it is awesome and has tons of monthly-specific info. on travel/prices/etc..........