2023 Tour – The Nature of Japan – Judith Salmon Travel

Art, History Culture

Tour dates: 17 to 30 May 2023

This tour is fully booked
Enquiries and expressions of interest for 2024 to Judith:
0409 618 499 or email – artytravel2@gmail.com

May is an ideal time to visit Japan. The transition between Spring and Summer offers a colourful and comfortable opportunity for us to explore the aesthetic relationship between Nature and Japanese Culture. The cherry blossoms will have given way to the wisteria, hydrangeas, irises and vivid-pink shiba flowers; and the crowds of Sakura-spring tourists will have dispersed.

Arriving in Tokyo, we are instantly immersed in the hectic, hyper-modern cosmos of 21st century Japan. In just a few hours, however, at the Meiji Shrine, we enter a 70-hectare evergreen forest, the spiritual heart of Tokyo and are reminded of the historic and ongoing connections between Nature and Japanese culture.

Our exploration of this fascinating relationship will take us from Tokyo to Kanazawa, from Kanazawa to Kyoto, and finally to Hiroshima. Along the way we visit art galleries and museums, both traditional and contemporary; gardens, large and small; wander streets, old and new, and sample some of the best Japanese food imaginable.

It is in Kyoto though, the once Shogunate capital of Japan, that we most clearly feel the strong multi-layered past permeating the present – Shinto Shrines and Buddhist Temples, immaculate Zen gardens and bamboo forests, streets lined with traditional wooden teahouses, apprentice geisha giggling behind windows in Gion and strains of Edith Piaf from a tiny teahouse along the Philosopher’s Walk. Traditional, handcrafted ceramics, Samurai swords, hand-woven and embroidered kimonos, bullet trains, Diamaru, Gucci and Hello Kitty – this is the nature of Japan today.

INCLUSIONS & HIGHLIGHTS

Return Economy Class flights from Sydney to Tokyo with Japan Airlines
12-nights upscale accommodation with traditional Japanese hospitality, daily breakfast and Wi-Fi
4 nights Tokyo; 2 nights Kanazawa; 4 nights Kyoto; 2 nights Hiroshima
Ota Memorial Museum, Yai Yoi Kusama Museum, the Mori Art Museum in Roppongi Hills
Kanazawa with famous Kenrokuen Garden and Castle + geisha district + Samurai House + 21st Century Contemporary Art Museum
Hiroshima’s Peace Memorial Park & Museum, Orizuru Tower & Lookout, Miyajima Island
Kyoto’s Zen Temples and Gardens, guided evening walk through Gion
Explore Japanese Buddhism
Stunning Miho Museum, out of Kyoto
Travel by high-speed Shinkansen (the bullet train)
All sightseeing, cultural activities and private guiding, including entrance fees (as per itinerary)
Private coach transfers where required
Welcome Lunch and Farewell Dinner
Plenty of shopping time
Pre-departure art and cultural background information with your leader, Judith Salmon.