2006 Summer Japan Touring Expedition
 

Dear All,

I'm from HK and currently in Shanghai, I will be doing a Japan Round Trip this summer using around 2 months. I will be arriving at the Osaka Port on 9th July, first destination will be Nagoya then Tokyo and heading to north over the east coast. After touring the Hokkaido, I'll be heading to South through west coast highway then to Kushu and then back to Nagoya where the touring come to an end.

Hope to see you guys on the road !!! if anyone are doing a similar route let's see if we can tour together !

Chris, if the time is good, hope to see you too in Tokyo !!!

Ok guys, the trip planning so far is doing good now and in the middle stage.

Last week I've been to the service to do 60000km maintaince including replacing the coolant pump, cam-belt, power-belt, belt tightener, in addition I also replaced 3 neuspeed light weight power pully and replaced all coolant.

Now I'm trying to get the Japan Mandatory Vehicle Insurance, so far I contacted a couple of government department already, once Insurance company in Japan they provide English Service, their Agents too !

Guys may see from the following link for getting vehicle insurance in Japan (Will keep it update once I got new information)

http://www.horizonsunlimited.com/hub...a-or-kobe-4287

Next week's job will be buying ferry tickets and further vehicle maintaince as well as fine tune.

Ok guys, here are some updates:

Last friday, I've been to the ferry company "CHINJIF" and bought tickets, actually, one of the members here in HUBB "Anton Post" had used their service last year for shipping his bike.

Their ticket office address and GPS location are as follows:

Level 18
908 Dong Da Ming Road
Shanghai, China
(31*15.1690N 121*30.0150E)

The cost of the ticket was RMB1600, the sales told me that it's a room for 4 ppls, but I got discount by showing up my student card, RMB1440 finally, see below.

http://forum.caranddriver.com.hk/dow...4/DSC_6181.jpg

But regarding shipping my car, their staff shown their unhelpful poor customer service, they just told me that I can't ship my car and they boldly told me that they are sure that chinese customs will not let my car leave. What kind of nonsense is this !??

And then they start saying something stupid like why not rent a car in Japan, the cost of shipping my car can almost cost 4 times of buying a car. Stupid !!! I said, u won't ship my car by charging me for a million do you ? Then they kept silent. Afterwards, they said they do not have cargo space, and the July bookings are all full, that's even impossible.... I don't believe that they have such good cargo business, as least all these nonsense shown me that how they wanna to avoid in such an inquires that they had no experience b4.

Infact they do have a cost for shipping a car, it's USD52 per cubic meter, then I ask them what does it mean for printing such cost on the advertisement if they don't wanna to ship my car, their answers were even rediclious, they told me that it has no meaning, it's just for reference....

God... this is really rediclious, I asked them why the customs won't let my car leave, they just said they won't becasue I simply can't.... what kind of bullshit is this ?

So what I will do on my departure day is, I'll drive my car to the port, like Anton did, go through the passport checking, then to the customs declear my car there, and keep argue with them.

Ok, will continue this thread when there are updates.

Guys, here are the updates so far:

Finally, I received the true copy of the Japanese Mandatory Insurance from a Japanese insurance company called ACE. (PLEASE NOTED THAT I'M GETTING IT WITHOUT A CARNET THIS TIME), the insurance will cover the whole Japanese Country, the cost of the contract is JPY$7120, valid for 2 months, please take a look at the contract below.

http://forum.caranddriver.com.hk/dow..._insurance.jpg

This time, the insurance agent that I'm using is in Tokyo, called "MOJUMDAR & Co.", the person who handel my case is called "Kawasaki Minoru", he is very helpful and fast respond to all of my inquires, he speaks flurent English, and has experience in dealing with foreign registered vehicle in Japan either with a CARNET or without a CARNET.

The application was pretty much straight forward, you may have to fax or email him the followings photocopies:

Vehicle Registration Papers
Chassis No.
Engine No.
Driver's License
International Driver's License
Passport

As soon as they received your documents, they will give u their bank account information, just TT the money to their bank account, when they recieved the money, they will send you a true copy of the insurance contract.

Contact details of the said insurance agent:

MOJUMDAR & Co. (agent of ACE)
Key contact: Mr.Kawasaki (he can speak English)
TEL: 81 3 3281 2119
FAX: 81 3 3281 2118
EMAIL: minoru@gol.com
URL: http://www.mojumdar.com

It's less then 2 weeks before my actual departing date, I will do further maintaince of my car this week include changing suspension rubbers, engine and gearbox mount, engine and gearbox oil.

Ok, will keep this thread update when there are other news !