Tokyo Morning Tour: Meiji Shrine, Senso-ji Temple and Ginza Shopping District

Tokyo, Japan

See Tokyo's highlights on a four-hour morning sightseeing tour. A perfect introduction to the first-time visitor, your professional guide will escort you through Meiji Shrine, Imperial Palace East Garden, Asakusa Kannon Temple. You'll also spy colourful Nakamise shopping street and drive through the Ginza district on your morning city tour through Tokyo.

Your morning sightseeing tour includes the following highlights:

• Meiji Shinto shrine, Japan's most famous Shinto shrine, dedicated to the Emperor Meiji and his consort.
• Akasaka Palace, now known as the Akasaka Guest House and used as state accommodation for visiting dignitaries
• Driving past the Japanese Capitol (House of Parliament)
• Strolling through the impressive Imperial Palace East Garden, once the grounds of an old Edo castle, with a tea pavilion, Japanese garden, moats and stone walls. Itinerary will be replaced with a visit to the Imperial Palace Plaza)
• Asakusa Kannon Temple (also known as Senso-ji), the oldest and most popular Buddhist temple in Tokyo, with the golden image of Kannon, the Buddhist Goddess of Mercy
• Nakamise Shopping Street, a colorful shopping arcade crammed with tiny food and souvenir shops
• Driving through the famous Ginza shopping district, Tokyo's most celebrated shopping and amusement area

Plus you'll receive a free souvenir map of Tokyo!

USD $56.50

Review by: K K C	November 2011
Did this tour in the pouring rain in November but the guide was excellent and made the best of the situation. Would recommend to those who want to get a good overview and then later go back and explore more on their own...which is what I did.

Review by: Graham	September 2011
What a wonderful tour. Our guide Mai was superb. Meiji Shrine was beautiful, as were the gardens of the Imperial Palace. Loved the Senso-ji Temple and then being given some time to shop for souveneers. I've previously done the Dynamic Tokyo full day tour and this half day tour showed me different things. I was with 3 young children so the half day tour was an ideal length for children. Mai was just the best tour guide! She gave a wonderful insight into Japan. The tour was so well organised and efficient. Thanks for a great experience.

Review by: Danny P	September 2011
I had decided to tag along on my hubby's biz trip and wasn't sure if I would be able to manuever around Tokyo alone without speaking Japanese so I signed up for this tour. Mina, our guide, was charming and very knowledgable. I enjoyed it so much I decided to do the afternoon tour with her as well. I enjoyed the shrine and temple so much, I brought my hubby back on his day off to see them again. Thank you Mina for a great day! Tokyo is amazing!!

Review by: Christopher A	August 2011
Took the tour with my brother who was visiting Japan for the first time. I've lived in Japan for about 16 years now, but I'm not a student of Japanese history so I learned a lot on this tour. Very pleasant older Japanese man with a good sense of humor. My brother really enjoyed him too. He repeated a lot of important facts and dates for those of us with poor memories. Highly recommended!

Review by: Jane Alexander R	August 2011
Our guide was wonderful. Engaged, kind and knowledgable. It was well organized and perfect for a business traveler who has limited time but wants to see some of Tokyo's beautiful sights.

Review by: Mark	July 2011
Excellent introduction tour to Tokyo. Guide was good and tour was well organised. Shrines are well worth the visit. Leaves afternoon to explore the shopping areas of Asakusa or Ginza. Good value package

Review by: Vojtech C	July 2011
Rather disappointing, not too much to see

Review by: DOMINIC W	July 2011
Highly recommended if you only have half a day to tour around Tokyo. Excellent and very friendly tour guide.

Review by: Su Ling Y	June 2011
It was a good tour though the actual sights of visit were only few. (But of course we knew that at the time of booking). Our guide Ms Mina was good, she speaks good English and was funny. She was informative, and helpful. I think if the tour can start an hour earlier, say 8 am instead of 9am, they may be able to squeeze in more sights for a little extra.

Review by: Brenda L	May 2011
We thoroughly enjoyed our morning tour. The tour guide was very interesting and entertaining. Perhaps a little too much was tried to be covered in too short a time, making some things feel a bit rushed, but overall it was definitely worth doing.

Review by: Clarissa M	January 2011
The tour is a very good initial tour of Tokyo. The tour guide provided many info on the sights and history of japan.

Review by: Joseph W	January 2011
Great itinerary, guide.

Review by: h	December 2010
Excellent intro to key Tokyo sites and to quickly absorb the layout of the city for your remaining vacation.

Review by: Carol L D	October 2010
Enjoyed it--good overview of Tokyo.

Review by: Jeffrey W	October 2010
Get to see the highlights of Tokyo and worth doing the first day you are in Japan to get a good intro to the city.

Review by: Ludwig M	October 2010
Worth doing if it is the first time for you in Tokyo. As I had seen all the sights before it was nothing special anymore. The tour guide was average.

Review by: PETER C	September 2010
This is a great way to see Tokyo. Our tour guide was great and spoke English very well. Would highly recommend doing this tour for anyone who is only in Tokyo for a short period of time and would like to see the main sights.

Review by: Mary Jo N	August 2010
Fabulous tour and an amazing guide!

Review by: Peter F	August 2010
Really well organised. Our guide was great - full of energy and stories and her English brilliant. Altogether highly recommendable.

Review by: Thu-Huong N	August 2010
I enjoyed the tour but in looking back I'd have preferred to book the full-day tour with drop-off service to the hotel. Since I'm not familiar with subway and railway, taxi fare was too expensive.

Review by: Ronald V K	July 2010
The problem is that the city is too big and the traffic too heavy with attractions so far apart. We were more in bus driving to the few places and then only spend 30-45min at the place. It is easier to go to the attraction on your own by train and spend all the time you need there. The tour must rather concentrate for the morning on things on one side of the city and then on other attractions on the other side in the afternoon. Overall information, administration and organisation of the tours was very good and the staff very friendly. Busses clean and comfortable.

Review by: Anonymous	July 2010
Great tour and total package. Hotel pickup is a plus! Our tour guide knew very good English and good information about Tokyo. Would suggest doing this tour one of the first days you are in Tokyo to get a lay of the land.

Review by: Anonymous	June 2010
Great guide!

Review by: Kimberly B	June 2010
Shrine and temple very interesting. Flowers at Imperial Palace gorgeous.

Review by: Zina A	June 2010
The tour guide was good and the places were neat. It shouldn't really say a tour of Ginza since they don't really give your a tour, but only drop you off at this location. Also, it seemed a couple people were unaware they were getting dropped off and didn't know their way back home. All in all it was pretty good tour.

Review by: Tierza T, United States of America	May 2010
Another great guide, just enough information and time at the highlighted stops.

Review by: Anonymous, United Kingdom	May 2010
tour guide was brilliant

Review by: Anonymous, United States of America	May 2010
Great tour for first timers, recommend leaving the tour at Nakamise, to spend more time shopping.

Review by: BARBARA A	April 2010
This was a nice tour and I thought the tour guide did a great job. These are all places that could easily be seen by oneself, because they are in fairly close proximity to one another, but I was traveling alone and had very little time in Tokyo, so it worked out fine for me.

Review by: Lucy J	April 2010
This is a great few hours to show you a few interesting parts of Tokyo. As with some other tours they try to fit in a lot in the few hours you have but what they show you is beautiful. The Meiji Shrine is a stunning place to visit and we actually went back another day to spend more time there and to see more of it. During this tour we only got to spend 30 minutes here which isn't really long enough to take in what it has to offer and to explore everything else. Even though you spend a lot of time travelling to and from venues the tour guides are very knowledgeable about Tokyo and are constantly telling you what you are driving past and about the history of the area. You have a short walk through the Imperial Palace East Gardens which are beautiful and at this time of year the Cherry Blossoms are starting to come out. On the day we went id was raining which was a shame but we still saw the gardens and the blossoms. The tour ends in Ginza shopping district which is described as the New York of Tokyo. It has streets and streets of designer shops and department stores which you can spend hours in and thousands of yen! If you are interested here is where there is the Hello Kitty stores. There are about 4 Hello Kitty stores which have everything you could ever imagine! Very enjoyable but very busy!!

Review by: Anonymous, United States of America	March 2010
If you need a quick tour to see the highlights of Tokyo - I would highly recommend this trip. The tour guide knew so much and it was a great experience.

Review by: Thomas B, United States of America	March 2010
Our guide was wonderful. She spoke perfect English, gave us an in-depth overview of everything we saw, and made sure that when we left the tour in Ginza that we were comfortable that we could get back to the hotel. Great way to get your bearings to explore Tokyo on you own later.

Review by: Anonymous, Japan	March 2010
The perfect tour if your time is limited. Our tour guide was great, spoke very good english and was full of information.

Review by: Kimberly R	March 2010
Sights were decent and we covered a lot of ground. There was not enough background information about the locations and the guide's English was mediocre.

Review by: Anonymous, Australia	February 2010
Interesting.

Review by: Mary Jane W	January 2010
Both my sister and myself requested hotel pickup and dropoff. We were informed that we would not be brought back to our hotel. Our guide was in a great hurry. He started our tour by telling us we were behind schedule. We spent the rest of our tour rushing. The guide seemed very annoyed and had next to nothing to say about any of our sights. He ended up telling my sister and myself it would be better for us to be left by the temple instead of finishing our tour at Ginza. We felt so rushed and unwelcome that we were relieved to leave the tour early. Obviously, we are not happy with the guide. We would have liked our tour if our guide cared and had spent more time informing us about our sights and less time rushing us.

Review by: VICTOR V	January 2010
We could have done it better by using the JR Rail Pass. Maybe we should have taken the other city tour.

Review by: Marlene A, Germany	November 2009
Excellent guide, his English was quite good and he was very personable and shared lots of interesting info. I only had 1 day to spend in Tokyo on a Sunday, and this was very worth while and affordable. the right amount of time at each stop, although the shrineshopping at the end would have liked a bit more time. He did say we could stay on and take the subway, but being alone and not having any Japanese, that was a bit intimidating as a prospect. But still did manage to buy a few things. For sure would recommend the tour to others w limited time to get a flavor of Tokyo.

Review by: A F, United Kingdom	November 2009
Great tour if you don't have much time to spend in Tokyo but would like to see some of its major attractions and cultural places the gardens are beautiful during Autumn! - bit fast at time, probably not ideal if you have problems walking fast... but the guide was very knowlegeable and nice, we learned a lot and enjoyed it a lot!

Review by: Anonymous, Australia	November 2009
The tour was great - short, but we saw a lot. The guide was very knowledgeable, and had a good sense of humor. Would highly recommend it to anyone with a short amount of time in Tokyo.

Review by: Aurelie F	November 2009
Great tour if you don't have much time to spend in Tokyo but would like to see some of its major attractions and cultural places the gardens are beautiful during Autumn! - bit fast at time, probably not ideal if you have problems walking fast... but the guide was very knowlegeable and nice, we learned a lot and enjoyed it a lot!

Review by: Anonymous, Australia	October 2009
A great way to get your bearings of Tokyo and see popular shrines and temples. Glad that it was a half day tour and finished up in time for lunch in Ginza. The guide was entertaining, polite, and informative.

Review by: Anonymous, United States of America	October 2009
This was a great orientation for the first time visitor. Our tour guide was amazing, informative, friendly and helpful. She was very well informed - in fact, I asked her about kimonos for dogs, and she took the time to walk me to the store that sold them. Highly recommend this tour!

Review by: Norman P, Australia	October 2009
The tour was well organized and on time. The bus was very clean and the tour guide was very informative and friendly. He done a very job of explaining in English. The sights we saw gave a good introduction to Tokyo. Hotel drop off would be a bonus. Thanks!

Review by: Wayne M, United States of America	September 2009
The guide was very knowledgeable and entertaining.

Review by: Jerilyn G, United States of America	September 2009
This was an excellent tour and our tour guide was exceptionally well spoken and informative.

Review by: Anonymous, Australia	September 2009
The service was excellent! The tour guide was very articulate and very knowledgeable.

Review by: Michael S, Netherlands	July 2009
Good tour, saw lots of things, friendly tour guide, good hotel pickup and clear instructions in how to get back! Very very important.

Review by: Allison K, United States of America	June 2009
My friends and I took this tour as a introduction to Tokyo. We all really loved it. It is a good way to get familiar with the city. We didn't really know what we were getting into with this tour because we are a younger group (18 to 22 years old), but we loved it. Tour guide was funny & sights were great way to start the trip.

Review by: Margaret D, United States of America	April 2009
Both the shrine and the temple were very interesting. We also visited the beautiful Imperial Palace East Garden. People could remain at the temple do shop on an adjoining street or get dropped off at Ginza. The drive around Tokyo from one place to another was also interesting. We had a very good guide. On all the tours, the guides gave us instructions of how to return to our hotels via the subway.