Hello, I recently read this article pertaining to ticket sales for the Ghibli theme park.
Studio Ghibli theme park announces VERY low daily attendance caps, start date for ticket sales
I’m planning my trip to Japan in November (provided tourism opens) and this may be my only trip to Japan. Reading that I may not be able to visit the whole park is incredibly upsetting.
I’ve felt a lot of overall stress in regards to all things Ghibli in planning this trip. (Ghibli is pretty much my main reason for visiting) so my questions are:
1. What does this mean for overseas tourists trying to purchase Ghibli theme park tickets? Is it allowed? How do I do this without speaking/reading Japanese?
2. Are Ghibli museum tickets even available to overseas guests right now? On the Ghibli museum site it looks like no.
I’m not sure of the best ways to do all of this. Especially since there isn’t a lot of information online regarding this. Thank you in advance.
8 comments
1. Right now the only possible way to buy tickets online would be from Boo-Woo, that seems to be in Japanese only. So what you do to buy tickets without reading Japanese ? You wait for them to release a way to buy tickets. Anyway we don’t even know yet if Japan will be open fully for November, so you would run the risk of not even being able to go even with tickets.
2. It’s right, bot JTB and Lawson online are unavailable right now. I would not be surprised if many people try to buy ticket then get refund because they obviously cannot enter Japan, so instead of dealing with that, they might have just stopped selling tickets.
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It’s too new for much information to be available and the country is still close, so my advice would be to wait.
To use websites in other languages, open them in Chrome, then either there’s an option to translate at the right end of the URL bar, it does it automatically, or right click and select Translate page. If you’re on your phone in Chrome it should do it automatically. Text in images won’t be translated but everything else should be.
Honestly if you think this will be you’re only trip to Japan and your primary reason for going there is Ghibli related and the new park is a high priority, I would wait and delay your trip. If you go right when it opens you’ll most likely be dealing with some unforeseen issues as staff understand how the park should operate. If you can delay till the spring or wait till next year most of the kinks will probably be worked out by then.
If you don’t mind me asking, and partly because it sounds so ominous, but why do you think this would be your only trip to Japan?
Wait if this is your only trip you will ever do to Japan and this isn’t based on timing. Saying that, a trip to Japan isn’t as daunting or as expensive as many may think. My flights to nyc were more expensive than what I could have paid to go to Japan, and my hotel is more expensive than a similar speced one in Japan was
I feel like it is better to wait. The park is not yet done and it looks like Japan will not open that soon
So only half of the park is opening this November. The next half will probably be open by the end of next year. If you want the full experience? I would wait until next November. That’s when I’m going.
I really hope you get to go! I have been looking into a trip for next summer and have found some cool Ghibli places that you can visit if the park is not open for international tourists in November. Shirohige’s Cream Puff Cafe in Tokyo looks brilliant if you like Totoro. The Giant Ghibli Clock near Shiodome Station, Tokyo. Personally for me the best Ghibli is Whisper of the Heart and in Seiseki Sakuragaoka Station there is a walk based on the film. Also apparently there is a great Ghibli shop in Tokyo SkyTree and all around Tokyo there are Donguri (studio Ghibli shops). Fingers crossed we get news soon and you can go to the museum and the park!