AKIHABARA NEWS
 
One of the things that Japan is famous for is its punctuality. This is best demonstrated by the railway system, where at peak times trains run on the same tracks every 2-3 minutes and which is only possible because the operators have a target of a 99.9999% error-free rate (one error per million). As a result, trains pretty much run on time all the time. The average delay for a Shinkansen train is about 20 seconds, and for other JR trains about 50 seconds. Or put another way, 95% of all Shinkansen trains leave and arrive within one minute of schedule, and on the rest of the JR network, 90% of trains do.
 
This obsession with punctuality lets Japan be efficient and productive. Of course it's not just trains. Think about store opening/closing times, lunch time menus (ok, irritating when you arrive at noon and can't get the breakfast menu!), weddings and funerals, and even the finishing times for sports events. We recently participated in a 110km cycling race, and were asked to nominate how quickly we could finish, so that the organizers could slot us into an appropriate starting wave. I suppose with 2,000 people in our category, and 6,500 participating in the cycling event overall, this level of obsession with punctuality is probably acceptable.
 
But one excellent group of punctual service companies you seldom hear about are the nation's parcel delivery companies (takkyubin). As readers who are residents will already know, the nation's parcel delivery companies are just as awesome as their railway cousins.
 
So how does this apply to travel?
 
Well it's a sad fact that public transport in Japan is poorly designed for holiday makers schlepping around large, heavy bags. We feel sorry for foreign tourists getting off the NEX train at Tokyo station being confronted with long flights of stairs to get to the various suburban lines. The reality is that the transport system was developed to move commuters around, and to fit this reality Japanese going on holiday pack small bags and strollers that will fit up on the parcel racks. There are few places on a busy Shinkansen or commuter train to put a full-sized 20kg suit case -- a bit of a shock to independent travelers.
 
Little wonder, then, that most people either stick with tour buses which are built for luggage handling, or they tend to only move "base" (cities and a chosen hotel therein) a couple of times during their 10-day stay here.
 
But there is another way, taking advantage of the worst and best of Japan's transportation system. A friend and I wanted to do a road cycling tour in Shikoku and knowing that luggage was going to be a problem, we decided to embark on an experiment. We packed all our stuff (other than the bikes, which went in train-regulation bike bags), such as spares, fresh clothes, cameras, etc., into two overnight bags each. Then, using takkyubin, we decided to find out if it was possible to ship a bag ahead each day, so that we could use a two-day bag relay system for each hotel stay.
 
It actually worked out really well. At Narita on the first day, we shipped the second bags by courier right from the baggage shipping area on the Arrivals floor, to Kotohira, Shikoku, some 50km east of Takamatsu in Kagawa-ken. Then we took our number one bags and the bikes on board the plane with us. We used JetStar, which only charged us JPY8,000 to fly and another JPY3,000 or so to ship the bikes and overnight bags (one each). I love JetStar for its pricing and luggage strategy. You only get what you need.
 
The morning after arriving in Takamatsu, we asked the hotel staff to assist us in shipping the first bags to our third hotel stay, in Kazurabashi, Tokushima, while we rode our bikes bag-free to Kotohira. It cost us all of JPY800 each to ship the two overnight bags (about 10kg each) from Takamatsu to Kazurabashi, a place so small and remote, you'll struggle to find it on a map! The major attraction at the hotel there is a wonderful outside rotenburo that you take a funicular to get to and which overlooks the valley and the tree-covered mountains opposite.
 
You can see the hotel here: http://bit.ly/1183shk
 
So what we learned as a rule of thumb is that if you want your bags to arrive by the evening of a given date, so long as you are on the same island as the destination (in our case Shikoku), then you can send the said luggage by the evening pickup time of the previous day. It doesn't seem to matter how remote the location, so long as they have your bag before around 16:00-17:00 (check with the hotel when you first arrive), it will get to the next stop by the next evening.
 
We also discovered that on Shikoku at least, pretty much every hotel had a shipping agent relationship with Yamato, and so were happy to receive our bags and ship them on -- I'm sure the commission is a welcome windfall. Not being great at Kanji place names in Shikoku, we would ask the hotel staff, typically little old ladies who ran the souvenir kiosk in the hotel, to do the honors. This is one part of the process where you probably do need some Japanese ability -- unless you have someone pre-fill the transportation forms before you embark on the trip, which I strongly recommend.
 
The takkyubin pricing system is rather fascinating and obviously prices don't get changed often. Each little old lady had the same miniature takkyubin-supplied tape measure that has centimeters marked on one side and the price of a given parcel within certain zones on the other. For Shikoku, the zone was the whole island, so the measurements were simple and the prices were extremely reasonable. The most expensive leg for us was for the two overnight bags sent from Narita to Kotohira, which cost JPY1,500 each.
 
We discovered that parcels are priced according to their edge-to-edge size (H x D x W), with some surcharges for zones beyond the main islands. The largest size you can ship with the major players (Yamato and Sagawa) is 1.6m (and 25kg), so it's worth checking that your bags don't individually exceed this size. Find another bag if they do.
 
Now, in our case my cycling partner had a bike case that was 2m, and even though it only weighed about 15kg, there was no way that nice little old lady was going to take it -- even after 10 minutes of begging...! So in the end, I had to call Yamato in Tokyo who revealed that while their takkyubin division couldn't handle it, their furniture shipping division could. The only downside was that it cost 3 times more (JPY7,500) and took three days to get to its destination, which was Matsuyama, on the opposite side of Shikoku. Luckily our bike trip was a week long and my friend didn't need the bike case until his flight back to Australia, so this worked for us.
 
I can't tell you what a pleasure it was cycling through the autumn leaves in the mountains of Shikoku, with just a backpack on and knowing that a fresh change of clothing and camera battery chargers would be waiting for us when we hit the next onsen. Absolutely no schlepping, leaving us to spend all our energy on those numerous mountains that look so small on the map...! Indeed, up in one of the mountain passes we met a fit-looking Spanish couple who were touring the normal way, with at least 20kg of luggage shoe-horned into panniers on their bikes (well, mostly on her bike, actually). We had to admire them for their strength and determination, but again gave a silent thanks to Yamato for its reliable fleet delivering our toothbrushes and fresh underwear to the next hotel... :-)
 
The Yamato website is quite usable. Most of what you need is in English and you can call them in English, Yeah, OK, we did do some of it in Japanese, but this is because we could, and I think the English hotline would work if you really needed it. Just be aware of their business hours if you have a problem to resolve.
 
http://www.kuronekoyamato.co.jp/en/personal/