Kansai in Japanese kanji is 関西. It literally means the west border. Kyoto, Osaka and Kobe are some of the major cities in the Kansai region. (to learn more about Kansai read the wikipedia article here.)
Kanto in Japanese kanji is 関東. It means the east border. Some of the major Kanto cities are Tokyo, Yokohama, Chiba and so on. (Learn your geography on wikipedia.)

When we did our June 2008 trip to Kyoto, Osaka and Tokyo, we decided to take the Shinkansen from Osaka to Tokyo. After a quick check …

When our 1 year in Japan was just about coming to an end we decided to do one last trip down south before we left. We had already traveled through all of Hokkaido, visited Kyoto and Tokyo (a few times), so we decided that it was time to see Hiroshima, and revisit the Kansai area.
We booked a tour package through JAL tour which is operated by JAL (Japan Airlines) ((beware, the website requires mad Japanese skills)). It may have been called a tour, but essentially it just meant …