Mark your calendars: Tokyo Motor Show 2009: Oct 24 to Nov 4

If anyone here likes cars and is planning a trip to Japan soon, I highly recommend spending at least 2 days at Tokyo Motor Show, maybe even 3 or 4. In the past, it's only been passenger cars and motorcycles once every 2 years and then they'd have commercial vehicles in between. I believe it's consolidated into one show now and only once every 2 years.

I've been to it in 2003 and 2005 and will say it's the best auto show I've been to. (Been to Detroit's briefly in 2009 and ones in LA, SF and Seattle before.)

See TOKYO MOTOR SHOW WEB SITE for more info.

One might also want to try to take a Toyota plant tour and that of other automakers. See my post at http://priuschat.com/forums/gen-iii...de-in-tsutsimi-plant-videos-3.html#post877164. I have toured the Tsutsumi plant before and did see 2nd gen Priuses in production, well before I owned or was really ever interested in buying one.

 

At first, I was thinking no, since I've been to Japan 3x already. But now... I'm actually contemplating. Seattle to Narita around that time is $823 at min RT, nonstop which isn't THAT bad. Hmmm....

Only problem is that the dollar is so weak vs. the Yen that expenses might be a lot higher than my previous trips. It's 88.4 yen to a dollar. IIRC, in my past trips it was in the 110-120 range.

 

Wow, even though the exchange rate for the US dollar is crap, I'm amazed that hotel prices still aren't that bad. I was thinking of bidding on priceline.com but I see the Shinagawa Prince Hotel in Tokyo (stayed there before - tiny but clean) for only ~$76/night on Expedia for the cheapest rooms. That's about what I paid when I stayed there in 2001!

 

Woah, a search on Kayak shows SEA <-> NRT, Oct 26, return Nov 4 at $700 nonstop! That's quite good now. Hmmm...

 

Ok. I bought my tickets last night. I'm going to South Korea first but I wanted to go to Japan 1st so that I could more easily make it to the Tsukiji fish market in the morning. Unfortunately, no matter what dates I chose, it made the trip $200-$400 more expensive.

I'll arrive at Narita 11/1 2:25 pm and leave 11/6 5:30 pm. I plan on spending 2.5 to 3 days at Tokyo Motor Show depending on how much interests me this time.

My ticket was $903.50 which is SEA > ICN > NRT > SEA.

 

Anyone else here going? I'd imagine ken1784 is going since Yokohama's not THAT far from the venue.

The Prince Shinagawa hotel is >$76/night now because I'm not staying in Japan long enough. I've had no time to do planning for the Korea portion (first part of my trip) yet. I've got reservations for a DMZ tour though. Hope there aren't any tensions that cause it to be canceled.

It'll be interesting to see the Sai and all the other green technologies everyone else is pushing. CES in January 09 marked the first (or one of the first) times I saw many consumer electronics companies really emphasizing green in materials, manufacturing and power consumption, even putting new and future models side by side with older power hungrier models.

If anyone has any insights into budget Japanese hotel chains, please see (my) post 25 at http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/japan/300546-budget-tokyo-hotel-suggestions-2.html and its replies along w/some of the suggestions that came up.

I just reserved a room at http://www.tokyustay.co.jp/e/hotel/MON/ and it's going to be ~$61/night (USD) for part of the stay ~$84/night for the other part.