Judy Zhang

We both really enjoyed our trip to Japan. It was a long time dream trip that finally happened.
KimKim was introduced to us by a mutual friend who had benefited from your services before on a trip to Japan. We decided to contact you and are very glad we did.
Judy was very helpful, patient, accommodating and understanding as our primary liaison/contact with KimKim. She responded quickly when we had questions and showed flexibility when we suggested changes to the itinerary. In short, she was wonderful to deal with and we would not hesitate to work with her again.
All of our guides were superb!
Yuki, Hiroshi, Mayumi, and Moto were informative, friendly and courteous. We liked them all!

Thank you again for an amazing experience!

Judy was absolutely Wonderful! She fit in everything I wanted to do for my Trip to Japan and was super flexible and easy to work with. She stayed on top of all my reservations and had seamless Transportation! I will definitely be booking with her again when I go back to Asia! Zumi, my tour guide in Kyoto, was simply the best! He was super friendly and knowledgeable and I had a great time "chasing the cherry blossoms" with him! 10/10 would recommend!

Activity Reviews

Tokyo Night Foodie Tour in Shinjuku

Tokyo

LOVED this experience! You can never have too much food in Tokyo - Plus we got the added bonus of great views and experiences along the way since it was a walking tour. Our Guide was amazing and we were her last tour ever! The food selection was wonderful and very different at each location so we got to experience a little bit of everything!

Quality of Experience

Guides, Drivers and Staff

Chase Cherry Blossom in Kyoto

Kyoto

Zumi was absolutely wonderful!!!! He was super friendly and knowledgeable! He was great at taking pics as well! he made the day seem effortless and he knew all the best spots to see the Cherry Blossoms! 10/10 would recommend Zumi to anyone going to Kyoto!!!

Quality of Experience

Guides, Drivers and Staff

Zumi went above and beyond to make sure I was taken care of - from the first moment to when we said Goodbye!

Transport

Kimono Tea Ceremony at Kyoto Maikoya

Kyoto

This was such a fun experience! I got to wear a traditional Kimono and the Tea Ceremony was fully immersive!

Quality of Experience

Judy from Kim Kim was very helpful and listened to what we wanted as a family. Judy paired us with a private tour guide called JJ from Nara to Oaska, JJ was a great guide and well informed, she even it took one for the team when the deer's were chasing us food.
Thank you, highly recommend Judy from the Kimkim Tour group.

Hotel Reviews

The Bridge Hotel Shinsaibashi

Osaka

Hotel was in a perfect location to food and transport & night life. Rooms were smallish especially when sharing but all in all it was clean and had great amenities. Breakfast was included and enough variety available.

Authenticity & Character

Location

Staff

Cleanliness & Comfort

Kyoto U-BELL Hotel

Hotel was in a good location to food and transport. Rooms were reasonable with queen bed especially when sharing but all in all it was clean and had great amenities. Breakfast was included and enough variety available.

Authenticity & Character

Location

Great location to transport & food

Staff

Cleanliness & Comfort

Tokyo Bay Ariake Washington Hotel

Hotel was in a good location to food and transport. Rooms were small especially when sharing but all in all it was clean and had great amenities. Breakfast was included and enough variety available.

Authenticity & Character

Clean and good amenities

Location

Near train stations restaurants

Staff

Cleanliness & Comfort

Activity Reviews

Osaka Local Foodie Tour in Dotonbori and Shinsekai

Japan

Hide our foodie tour guide is a legend, he was funny, easy going and pleasant to share meals with. He was a great guide and answered questions not related to food as well.

Full Day Nara City Tour, Overnight in Osaka

Japan

Our guide JJ from Nara to Oska was informative and very pleasant to deal with, she was always helpful in answering our questions.

Quality of Experience

Guides, Drivers and Staff

Transport

Kimono Tea Ceremony at Kyoto Maikoya

Kyoto

We got to experience wearing a Kimono, the staff were very helpful and informative when dressing you. Our host teaching us the traditions of why they have a tea ceremony was very informative and pleasant.

Quality of Experience

Guides, Drivers and Staff

Transport

Perfectly planned and executed! Judy was an amazing to work with. She customized our 9 day trip to Japan with our family of four. The trip was comprehensive and all inclusive of hotel, transportation and activities, less airfare. All the hotels were of excellent quality and all centrally located. All tour guides and transportation specialists communicated at least one day in advance to confirm all our bookings throughout the trip. They were all very knowledgeable and provided superb, quality service. Judy had recommendations and answered all our questions. She was available and communicated throughout the whole trip. I would highly recommend KimKim and would definitely use them again for our next trip to Japan or Asia. Our trip went as perfectly as can be!

Hotel Reviews

The Royal Park Hotel Iconic Osaka Midosuji

Osaka

Great hotel. Our hotel got two people and had do split up our family of 4 into two connecting rooms which worked out okay too. Rooms were smaller than other hotels but clean, classy. Located in a business district. Hotel is more for professionals and business. One subway stop away from Umeda which is the big central station with shops. Overall very nice hotel.

Authenticity & Character

Location

Staff

Cleanliness & Comfort

GOOD NATURE HOTEL KYOTO

Kyoto

Very nice hotel. Nice, clean, green, modern. Great breakfast. Spacious room to fit our family of 4. Located in the center of action, shops and restaurants.

Authenticity & Character

Location

Staff

Cleanliness & Comfort

&Here TOKYO UENO

Tokyo

Perfect for families. Love that Ueno Park is across the street for a stroll. Safe. Clean. Spacious. Centrally located. Kids loved the bunk beds.

Authenticity & Character

Location

Across the street from Ueno Park, near zoo and central to transportation

Staff

Cleanliness & Comfort

Activity Reviews

One Day Miyajima Island and Hiroshima Tour

Japan

Quality of Experience

Guides, Drivers and Staff

Guide was the most knowledgeable guide we have evee experienced.

Transport

Bonsai Garden at Hoshun-in Temple (Daitokuji Temple)

Kyoto

Very beautiful trees and meticulously maintained garden.

Quality of Experience

Guides, Drivers and Staff

Transport

Kimono Tea Ceremony at Kyoto Maikoya

Kyoto

Nice experience of Japanese customs and tradition. We did this with our 8 and 11 year old. The event is very formal and very respectful.

Quality of Experience

Guides, Drivers and Staff

Full Day Kids-Friendly Tokyo City Tour with Akihabara

Tokyo

Quality of Experience

Guides, Drivers and Staff

Transport






For our part, we realize that planning should have begun earlier — probably 6 months in advance, because certain tours, hotels, etc were already booked. Nevertheless, Judy was terrific and resourceful, getting back to us quickly despite the challenges of being in different time zones. Our goals (arts and hands-on) were different from those of a typical tourist; Judy was good at accommodating them. We could have used more advice about the differences in those programs, so we researched them on our own. That meant we had to request additional things and changes as we learned about them.

Also, we made a scheduling error, not realizing that the flight arrived the day after it began, so Judy had to adjust our bookings to accommodate this. We threw her an extra challenge by asking her to add a day-trip to Hamamatsu for a family visit. Also, a freak accident on the take-off of our flight to Tokyo caused us to be re-routed through Europe, hence losing another day. Altogether, this meant our proposed 14 day trip had to be jammed into a shorter number of days. Upon retrospect, even without these unexpected adjustments, we should have allowed ourselves three weeks to do everything we wanted to do and to give ourselves more time for exploring on our own. An open day in each city would have been preferable and made for a more relaxed trip.

Tour guides - Guides in Tokyo and Kanazawa were excellent and flexible. However, Michiko (Kyoto), though eager to please was less well-informed and had weaker English. She was too focused on Samurai/Shogun history and wanted to take too many photos of us. We were surprised that her tour involved walking and buses, which worked out fine, but we were surprised as we expected a driver in each location unless specified.

Workshops and presentations - Our first workshop (sushi making) was a disaster. We were told to get there on our own by local train, but had no previous instruction about how to navigate. When we arrived at the address we were given, there was no signage and no staff there to greet us, so we didn’t know if we were in the right place. After contacting Judy, we discovered that the company had made a scheduling error, which they corrected as quickly as possible. The workshop was ok in spite of the space with was filthy with cigarette butts and used cups on the table. Looking online afterwards, we saw that there were many other sushi workshops that might have been better choices.

The other workshops were all excellent: washi paper making, dyeing, the artisan visit (embroidery), and an unscheduled visit to a gold leaf workshop that our guide created since we had extra time.

Transportation - There was a lot of transportation that we had to navigate on our own. We found it quite challenging, especially at first. We would have benefited from more advance information about how to manage the different systems and locations (some with QR codes, some with one ticket, some with two tickets). Even after we requested more direction from Judy, we still found it difficult. Fortunately, we were assisted by train station personnel or sympathetic travelers or residents who saw us struggling and shepherded us to the right place.

Hotels - Tokyo, Kyoto, Osaka were excellent; the hotel in Kanazawa was fair (amenities were better than we thought at first due to a communication problem). Still, the room was very small and one side of the bed was against the wall.

Due to the popularity of Naoshima, we were booked in Okayama, which required a ferry ride each way. There too one side of the bed was against the wall. Although it was advertised as a beachfront facility. In fact it was a block or two from the waterfront (not a beach) and overlooked a bicycle track. There was a night race one of the nights we were there, which was unique.

Judy was an excellent planner, responding cheerfully under a number of challenging circumstances. It would have been helpful to be advised about how realistic it was to see so much in a short time, especially given our age. Although we’re in good shape for our ages we are in our 80s. As mentioned above, we needed more assistance with independent train travel. It would also have been helpful to have advice about restaurants near our various hotels. We were told that the guides could help us, but they had no more knowledge than what they or we could find online.

Hotel Reviews

Cross Hotel Kyoto

Kyoto

Authenticity & Character

Location

Staff

Cleanliness & Comfort

Miyako City Osaka Hommachi

Osaka

Authenticity & Character

Location

Staff

Cleanliness & Comfort

SETOUCHI KEIRIN HOTEL 10 by Onko Chishin

Tamano

Inconvenient. Only recommended for bike racing enthusiats, adjacent to bike racing track. Description says beachfont but it’s over a block away from the water - essentially a small marina for fishing boats. No beach. We were only there because we weren’t able to book a place to stay on Naoshima and it was a 5 minute taxi ride to the ferry to Naoshima.

Authenticity & Character

Location

Staff

Cleanliness & Comfort

Hotel Intergate Kanazawa

Kanazawa

Functional, nothing special. Small room with one side of the bed against the wall.

Authenticity & Character

Location

Staff

Cleanliness & Comfort

Mitsui Garden Hotel Jingugaien Tokyo Premier

Tokyo

Authenticity & Character

Location

beautiful but far from anything other than an olympic stadium

Staff

Cleanliness & Comfort

Activity Reviews

Kimono Tea Ceremony at Kyoto Maikoya

Kyoto

We didn’t realize that we’d have to wear kimonos. Wouldn’t have chosen to but it ended up being fun.

Quality of Experience

Guides, Drivers and Staff

Transport

Traditional Yuzen Dyeing Experience

Kyoto

Fabulous personal hands-on experience with a master artisan.

Quality of Experience

Guides, Drivers and Staff

Transport

Full-Day Exploration: Arashiyama Bamboo Grove & Kinkaku-ji Temple

Kyoto

Unless you’re really into the bamboo grove and this particular temple, time would be better spent looking at pictures, avoiding the crowds and doing something else.

Quality of Experience

Guides, Drivers and Staff

Transport

Gion Geisha Show and Walking Tour

Kyoto

We arrived too late for the walking tour but the Geisha show was fascinating.

Quality of Experience

Guides, Drivers and Staff

Transport

We took a taxi on our own.

Half Day Artisan Tour in Kanazawa

Kanazawa

Wonderful embroidery folks. Unexpected. We wouldn’t have selected embroidery but it was terrific as was the guide.

Quality of Experience

Guides, Drivers and Staff

Transport

Kanazawa Highlights with Art: Gardens, Castles & National Crafts Museum

Kanazawa

Intead of having a guide and driver, we traveled by bus with guide. Her English wasn’t as good as other guides and she was focused primarily on Samurai/Shogun. Sweet lady, though.

Quality of Experience

Guides, Drivers and Staff

Transport

Driver rather than buses.

Tokyo Sushi Making Experience & Japanese Cooking Class

Tokyo

Scheduled at the wrong time, difficult to find, no signage, dirty.

Quality of Experience

Guides, Drivers and Staff

Transport

Exploring Futuristic Odaiba with Sumida River Cruise

Tokyo

Wonderful guide, flexible so we were able to make changes to personalize the day.

Quality of Experience

Guides, Drivers and Staff

Transport

Hector was excellent. Extremely knowledgeable and friendly.

Our favorite attractions were Osaka castle and the Nara temple visit.