Heian Shrine: Tours & Tickets

Terrific way to see places tourists would not normally see. Riding along the river, up quiet back streets, through parks and along trails, gave you a real sense of the area while still visiting some interesting historical sites. Bikes are basic with 3 gears but quite sufficient for this trip for recreational riders of any age. No big hills and pace ok with plenty of stops. It was about 37 C and I am nearly 78 and still really enjoyed it! The guide was very knowledgeable and enthusiastic and gave plenty of interesting anecdotes including insights into the Japanese language as he is an overseas higher degree student himself studying in Kyoto. Coupled with a full day bus tour of the main sites, I strongly recommend this tour to greatly enhance the Kyoto experience.

Our tour guide, Michael, was great - good English and had a lot of local knowledge and history to tell us. We had a nice small group of 6 of us and the cycle was at a good pace. You get helmets and cycling around the area felt safe. I felt like we saw a lot of places in the 3.5 hours we were going around and there was a good mix of cycling and also stopping to see some of the shrines and temples. The only thing I would recommend would be to add a stop for water or food as you have to bring your own but some people may forget, or it wasn't obvious.

The tour provided a good introduction to several major tourist sites in Kyoto without the hassle of public transport - we bought a single day ticket and took in the sights at Nijo castle gardens, Nishiki market, the Golden Pavilion and Kyomizu Dera - all easily accessible from the bus stops with helpful guides - before leaving the tour to use public transport to find the Fushimi Inari shrine. It was much appreciated that we were given plastic fans (of course with added advertising) and ice packs to keep us cool in the 37 degree temperatures.

We always try to do a bike tour when we visit a new city because you can cover a lot of ground and you feel more free than sitting on a bus. We had such a great time on this bike tour, our guide ‘Yutah’ (probably spelt that wrong) was very energetic, funny and informative. His English was fantastic and we had such a good time with him. He also left us with numerous food and shopping recommendations as we left. Can’t recommend this enough

We had a really good tour with Akiko in Kyoto. Akiko had very good english and was very friendly. She took us to the main highlights of Kyoto and was very informative. The pace of the tour was also very good as we did not want to be rushed. We really liked the walk through Gion district and the visit to the Golden Palace. We would hghily recommend a private tour with Akiko to get a good sense of Kyoto at the beginning of your stay.