Nice experience enjoying the sights and sounds. Lisa and her assistant were very helpful through the trip.

Great seeing those scenic views and take photos. But don’t expect you would be able to hang arounf for a long time. if you want to chill, this isn’t for you. If yoy want to take photos of those places and pack them all in one day, this is for you.

I don’t recommend this tour at all. The tour had several unnecessary stops (observatory, bear ranch) that offered no value and you have only 20-30 minutes at each stop which was a mad rush. Not recommended if you’re with seniors or kids. The only upside to this tour is that transport is covered, but I would rather take public transport next time to visit select locations (Noboribetsu, Lake Shikotsu) with ample time to breathe and enjoy the trip. The tour guide, while a nice person, conducted the tour in English and Mandarin, but he had an astonishingly poor command of the English language. It’s quite bewildering that he was assessed to be a qualified guide with the language gap. Also, he made several biased culturally insensitive comments about other nations and nationalities. Very unprofessional of a guide. The narrative should be kept to descriptions of the place we went to or passed by.

This is actually an excellent tour but I am not giving it five stars for the following reasons: 1. Pelago does a terrible job with the voucher it sends to customers. The one I received seemed to be an AI translation of what the agency provided in Chinese. My voucher included a map which was not meant to show the meeting point at all. There was no way to contact the agency/ guide ahead of the tour to seek clarifications. 2. The guide on my tour was great. Although she was bilingual, she spoke in her native Mandarin most of the time and sort of gave only summaries in English. This was not a problem for me but I felt the Westerners were shortchanged. In terms of what the tour covers, I have no complaints - many scenic sights to provide content for Instagram.

Good and very helpful guide. Pacing of the tour is just right and at times felt rushed.

Shao-san was our guide for the day. Tour was conducted in Japanese, Chinese and English all by himself. Most scenic stops are between 30 - 60 mins. The highlight of the trip was Noboribetsu Jigokudani Valley and Lake Toya. The lunch queue (Lake Toya stop) was longer as there were some restaurants that close on Monday. To maximize my time at Lake Toya, I bought lunch from convenience store instead and had it by the lake. The tour may feel rushed but reasonable given the number of stops in the itinerary. There were sufficient stops for toilet break too. Useful for traveler with limited time, save the hassle of navigating the public transport and language barrier. It was an enjoyable trip.