In 2014, we began to host small tours on the west side of Lake Biwa, Shiga prefecture. With your warm assistance, we were blessed to receive so many wonderful guests from around the world. 

 Our tours are focused on experiencing and learning about local people and their culture through activities such as farm to table cooking with the elders of beautiful villages and visiting a quiet local shrine together to feel the belief of the inhabitants. We were honored to receive numerous local awards for offering such tours that are both unique and original. 

 However, in this day and age, it is truly a great challenge to preserve those beautiful countryside sceneries that so charm us. Mountain villages are suffering from decreasing populations and, subsequently, abandoned fields increase each year. 

 It is immeasurable how much history and culture are lost once a house, a village or a field are left and forgotten. As we know, in many cases, local wisdom handed down over generations is far more sophisticated and interconnected than many modern technologies.

 Your choosing to visit this area and finding value in the life of the locals provides us with an opportunity to rethink how and why we need to continue making efforts to keep the environment, history and culture that form the foundation of their pride and enable them to continue to find value in their way of life. 

 The tour also made us realize that it is our important mission to shed light on the daily activities and pure hearts of the many nameless villagers who existed behind the cultural customs that have been passed down from our ancestors in this region. 

 We have witnessed many times guests from all over the world being deeply touched by the humble people of these nameless villages.

 We have seen the joy of acceptance and felt a little sliver of hope for the future, in addition to the remuneration we have received from our guests.

 We do not know to what extent this small tour will contribute to the sustainability of the region, but we hope that it will at least offer a beacon of hope for those who live and work here with pride.

 Therefore, we would like to offer our sincere gratitude for choosing to spend a day with us in a small countryside village instead of visiting a famous tourist attraction.

 We wish to remain a socially and ecologically responsible tour company. It has been our great pleasure to receive many comments from our guests that the tour they have taken with us was the highlight of their trip to Japan. 

 We would like to extend our invitation to you all to spend an unforgettable day in this beautiful Shiga prefecture and for this we will continue to make great efforts. 

 We are eagerly awaiting your visit.

Hiromi Kawaguchi （Director)