The most efficient historical day trip - We had a fabulous guide who was trilingual (Jap/Chinese/Eng). She gave us clear info and explanation about the tour. She told us which restaurants we must try and also the shops we should visit at Takayama. We also had an amazing time in Shirakawa seeing the old village and houses. We were always ahead in terms of timing and were able to miss the crowd…thanks to the driver! The bus was clean and comfortable. I highly recommend this trip for those who want to visit 2 UNESCO sites in one day.

Very good day - Shirakawa was amazing to visit! It was a very hot day bit with a good umbrella you'll survive! Takayama was also really nice to see. I would recommend this tour. However, just so you know, there are several nationalities therefore the tour is in English, Chinese and Japanese. Jin (our tour guide) said everything in 3 languages.

A transport service not a tour - Shirakawa is really really beautiful BUT if you are English speaking get a tour which is wholly done in English not in multiple languages. This tour is pretty much a transport service and nothing else. The splendour of Shirakawa made up for the subpar tour

Interesting tour which was not very well organised. - I have given this tour 3 stars because I believe that Viatour were remiss in communicating our booking for this tour to the Japanese tour provider. We booked on a tour with a maximum number of 25 tourists. On the day of the tour we found that there were around double that number of tourists going on that tour! When we arrived at the meeting place, our names were not on the list. This is despite me receiving confirmation messages and reminder messages. I was able to show these messages to the guide. Jane, our guide, did a great job particularly given the large number of tourists that she had to manage. The tour was a split of english speakers and chinese speakers. The bus driver also did a fabulous job!! On the return journey to Nagoya, there was dense fog. It was very, very difficult driving conditions as it was hard to see the road. The driver returned us to Nagoya safely. I would recommend this tour but preferably book directly with the Japanese tour company and not through Viatour. I think the third party interaction was the problem.

Budget friendly trip! Booked 1 month in advance - The places are amazing but wished it was more as a guided tour. There is walking and exploring time. So a little bit of research is needed.