Japan Spring Photo Tour

In our Japan Spring photo tour, you will enjoy the sakura in Japan at the most amazing & famous Japanese landmarks. During 15 days you will visit the best spots for chasing the sakura. Visiting the main cities and small villages from Tokyo to Kyoto and with special attention to the famous Mount Fuji.

On this Japan Photo Tour, you will also discover the Japanese culture in sacred places like Koyasan and its incredible cemetery. There we will live with Buddhist monks. For landscape lovers, we will visit Nara or the Kiso Valley, where we will enjoy the landscapes of Japan. Also, we will do a Japan snow monkey photo tour at the Jigokudani Monkey Park. In addition to other castles such as Osaka, Hikone, Matsumoto, or Himeji where we will chase the cherry blossom around the typical architecture of Japan.

Traveling to Japan is traveling to a unique country in the world. The Spring Japan photo tour aims to capture spectacular pictures of Japan in one of the most spectacular times to visit the country: The Sakura.

We will meet at our hotel in Tokyo where will start the photo tour during the Sakura to Japan. We will help you with the transfer to our hotel from both Narita and Haneda airports.

On this day we will visit to Shiba Park, located next to the Zojoji temple and the Tokyo Tower. Once we are done with sunset and night photos, we will have dinner before going to Meguro River. There we will photograph the Sakura at night when it’s illuminated. Features over 800 cherry trees lining the Meguro River, we will enjoy the blossom festival along the river. After that, we will spend the night at our hotel in Tokyo.

We will get up early to visit Asakusa during sunrise. We will photograph the cityscape with Tokyo Skytree and have time to visit the Sensō-Ji temple in the early morning. Touring the Asakusa neighborhood, one of the traditional neighborhoods of Tokyo at this time is the best to avoid crowds. 

In the afternoon, we will walk to the Chidorigafuchi area to walk around one of the most famous parks in Tokyo for sakura viewing. Here will spend the rest of the day, before we go to Roppongi Hills to photograph the city from its viewpoint.

Today we will pick up our car to start our trip around Japan. On our way to the west, we will visit Inokashira Park to enjoy the 500 cherry trees in the park. Also, we will have time to stop in some hidden temples on our way to Matsumoto.

Once in the city, we will have time to photograph the castle at sunset and enjoy the night illumination.

Firstly, we will get up early to photograph the castle at dawn. Straightaway we will move to Jigokudani Park, in Nakano. At this point, we can photograph the 200 wild snow monkeys that live in this park, taking baths in the park’s hot springs.

In the afternoon we will start our route to the south of Japan, stopping in the incredible town of Shirakawa-go, located in what is known as the Japanese Alps. After photographing it at sunset from the surroundings, we will go to our accommodation in Gokoyama. Certainly, this village is especially beautiful and here we will enjoy our traditional Japanese hotel. Since the traditional Japanese dinner (included in the price) to the outdoor and indoor hot springs.

We will get up early to photograph this beautiful village with the first rays of the sun. Forthwith, we will enjoy a traditional Japanese breakfast (included in the price), before we will start our journey again to reach our next destination: Hikone.

In the afternoon already in Hikone, we will have time to visit its impressive castle at sunset as well as the gardens that surround it. Once our session ends, we will continue our trip to Kyoto, in the middle of our Sakura Photography Tour.

In the early morning, we will approach a floating torii gate for sunrise. After finishing, we will have to have a well-deserved break at our hotel.

We continue our visit in the afternoon when we will approach one of the most incredible neighborhoods of our entire trip: Gion. Known as the geisha neighborhood, we can photograph geishas walking in their traditional costumes among old wooden houses and traditional merchants’ shops of yesteryear. The streets of the Gion neighborhood with the Kiyomizu-dera Pagoda in the background at sunset are one of the most popular views of all of Japan.

Today we will get up early enough to reach Fushimi Inari before sunrise and all tourists flood this iconic place. We will walk through its more than 10,000 torii at dawn, always looking for the best compositions and we will take advantage of the morning to visit this sacred mountain. 

In the afternoon we will come to walk along the path of the philosopher and if we have time to enter the gardens of the silver pavilion, close to the path.

At night, we will go to the To-ji temple, an ancient Buddhist temple that has the tallest 5-story pagoda in all of Japan.  After that, we will return to the hotel to rest and prepare for the next day.

We will get up early again to arrive before dawn at the Arashiyama bamboo forest. We will look for the best location to be prepared when the first rays of the sun enter this incredible forest. After our session ends, we will visit the nearby gardens of Okochi Denjiro and the temples of Tenryuji and Nonomiya near the forest.

After breakfast and check out, we will approach another of the most visited points of the city such as the Golden Pavilion, where we can photograph its incredible pavillion.

When we finish we will approach Osaka to rest in our new destination. We will have time for a sunset session at the castle.

In the morning we will go to the Osaka castle, one of the most spectacular in the whole country and that during Sakura offers unrepeatable views.

This day we will go after our visit to Osaka castle to Himeji, to stroll through the Koko-en Gardens near the impressive Himeji Castle. In which we will wait until sunset to photograph it in its maximum splendor.

At night we will visit the Dōtonbori area in Osaka where, in addition to recovering our strength by dining, we will be able to photograph its famous neons in one of the busiest streets in the city.

We will get up early to visit the city of Nara. Famous for the deer that walk through its streets, and that also preserves the traditional Japanese style in its architecture. There we will visit the Kofukuji and Horyuji temples, the first one was moved more than 1000 years ago from Kyoto and the second is the oldest wooden temple in the world.

After lunch, we will visit Mount Yoshino, where we will have one of the most spectacular views of our trip with the Nara mountains full of cherry blossoms and that in the afternoon will leave us some spectacular images to photograph.

At the end of our session we will go to our next destination in Koyasan where we will stay in a shukubo, a Buddhist temple that will offer us a unique experience. There they will be waiting for us to offer us a shojin ryōri style dinner that is typical of Mount Koya. After dinner we can take a bath or onsen, and even take a night walk around the temple.

The day will start at dawn, when the Buddhist monks wake us up to join their Otsutome ceremony, two hours where we can photograph them while lighting a bonfire and reciting sutras. Once the ritual is finished, they will offer us a typical breakfast to start the day with strength. We will use the day to visit the infinite number of monuments and temples of Mount Koya, where the Danjo Garan and, especially, the Kondo Hall, the Fear Hall, the Fudodo Hall, the Vermilion Konpon Daito Pagoda and the small Toto Pagoda stand out.

In the afternoon we will start our journey back north to get to the town of Nagoya.

After having rested, we will begin our walk through the Kiso valley. There we will visit the Magome & Tsumago villages. Located on the ancient Nakasendo route, was the traditional road from Edo (Tokyo) to Kyoto. Without a doubt, Tsumago and especially Magome were the two main resting points on this route between the main Japanese cities.

Once our route is finished, we will continue our trip to Fuji Five Lakes area for sunset.

In the next 2 days, we will photograph one of the most emblematic places of our trip: Mount Fuji. We will visit the surroundings of this impressive volcano, from the incredible views that the area known as the 5 lakes will give us.

We will concentrate to get our best sunrise or sunset from the Chureito Pagoda. From there, we can contemplate Mount Fuji and the cherry fields with the temple in the foreground. In addition, we will visit other spots such as the Fuji Shibazakura Festival, the old towns such as Iyashinosato, and waterfalls, or photograph the shinkansen with Fuji in the background.

We will use our second day to visit Kawaguchi Lake or repeat some locations of the previous day. Once our sunrise photos are done, we will have time for breakfast and a little break before coming back to Tokyo.

Again at the capital, we will spend our last hours in Japan visiting Shibuya & Shinjuku. At Shibuya, we will photograph the famous crossing from a viewpoint and do some street pics. And after dinner, we will visit the Shinjuku neighborhood, known for its small streets of restaurants. 

Today will finish our photo tour during Spring to Japan.