The people I met on Contiki were incredible and make the trip one I will remember forever.
However, I’d only recommend this trip if your intention is to meet people.
If you’re comfortable solo travelling, or have others to go with, I’d say do that. Contiki didn’t organise much for this trip, and our guide offered hardly any information.
We did walking tours with our guide, in which she would offer visual observations, omitting the pairing of this with a cultural or historical fact. Local guides were very helpful though.
The FTA’s were very fun, we did the Monkey Karting, (which Renee did not accompany us to) Nara and the Tea Ceremony - however just drops you off there, so it’s not like you couldn’t organise it on your own.
We got a heavy impression that Renee was seeking commission on the places she took us too - bars and clubs that were unpleasant, and upcharging us for Kimonos which she told us were “her special thing, not organised through Contiki.”
In Tokyo our accomodation was in the Sumo district - this meant we were an hour away from the main districts of Tokyo, which we felt had stripped us of a full experience. Not only because of the time lost travelling, (with trains stopping at midnight,) but because we didn’t get to observe the accomodation in the cities and see everyday life for locals.
There was also a sumo competition taking place on the particular week we stayed there, but didn’t mention it to us, we found the information ourselves. This would’ve been great to hear from our guide!
We would often ask Renee what the timeline and plans were for the next day, which she would say, “check the day sheet.” The day sheet would essentially say the date and have graphics accompanied by the title of the activity we would do - eg, ‘train to Kyoto.’
So on the day before we travelled to Kyoto, we asked her what the plan was, specifically with times, and she said we’d be travelling all day long. After a long night out, we arrive ready to train to Kyoto in long, baggy, comfy clothes, and we arrive in Kyoto by about it midday … then takes us to a coach (the only time we were on one) for a tour of two different temples. This would’ve been a great activity (one of the benefits of this contiki for sure,) except we were all boiling and feeling sick and uncomfortable- so we worked out transport back to the hotel to shower and change and head back to the temple that evening in our own time - we informed , and she simply said we couldn’t do that and we’d need to wait it out. Fair enough, the guidance you’re paying for, but I’m still unclear why we weren’t able to do that, and why she didn’t let us know we’d be spending hours walking through temples in our warm clothes in the middle of July!
Between Kyoto and Osaka, Contiki/ Renee actually lost one of our group members luggage, putting it on a seperate bus so it wouldn’t arrive in time for their plane home. This was also alarm bells for us, since it seems all you really pay for is accomodation and transport of yourself and your things - since so often our self transport was the group catching (often seperate) trains between cities, the luggage transportation was the only thing we really relied on, and then that trust was broken on the last day lol.
