Private guides in Tokyo and Kyoto
 

Can someone suggest good private tour guides for a couple on their first visit to these two cities?

We were delighted with the intelligent, knowledgeable, pleasant services of Jun in Tokyo. Several other Fodorites have also used her and were very pleased. Her email is [email protected]. Sorry she did not do Kyoto as well.

We used Jun at this person's suggestion. She was fantastic!! Not only was she able to suggest places we should see based on our interests, she was more than willing to take us to places we had already decided we wanted to see. Mention a food: she took us to a restaurant she thought served the best. She even helped us buy a camera by taking us to a recommended shop and translating for us. She was most patient with our hundreds of questions and was a wealth of information. I can't say enough wonderful things about Jun and how pleasant she was to work with. We thought this was some of the best money we spent in Japan.

A third vote for Jun, all the same sentiments; she is fantastic and you won't regret using her. We psent two full days with her and she made Tokyo more manageable.

Since we did Kyoto as a day trip from Tokyo we also hired a guide to make best use of our time.

We had a fine gentleman named Masu from MK Taxi company. We took the bullet train from Tokyo and he met us at the platform. Our hotel, the Hotel Seoiyo Ginza made all the arrangments. But MK Taxi's direct e mail is: [email protected]. Ask to have Masu; he also has taken around Paul McCartney! A very delightful and very knowledgeable man.

Have a ball!

I'm starting to think we would get more out of our few days in Tokyo and Kyoto with a guide as well. Could you give me an idea how much it costs for a day for each / either of those mentioned? Thanks

If no one answers, you will be abel to figure out cast by going back through previous posts. Elainee on this board used Jun as her guide in Tokyo last year and I believe she posted on cost. And KimJapan got a flyer in her credit card statement about the MK Taxi and gave us a website for MK last year also. So try to find MK's website and check Elainee's old posts for Jun's cost. MK is quite expensive if I recall correctly from my own research. Jun is much less, but I don't want to give you the exact prices that I recall as they might not be accurate.

Jun 's cost this past July ran us about a total of $300 for the two days.
And no tip of course

MK was expensive, about $400 for the day, but to me it was worth it since we were only there for 1 day. Masu like I said was fabulous.

Does this help?

Thanks Tripgirl, that does help. Jun sounds very reasonable, I will contact her.I don't think we'll be able to afford Masu though - and we do have more time available to us in Kyoto. I've heard good things on another forum about Chris Rowthorn in Kyoto - has anybody here used him?