In February 2017, general practitioners (GPs) from the Department of Community and Family Medicine of Fukushima Medical University in Japan visited Australia for a study tour where the tour participants met with local GPs, GP registrars and researchers. During this tour, we visited public hospitals and observed multiple GPs providing community-based health care. We also attended a new GP registrars' orientation where the two authors gave a presentation about the current status of primary care in Japan. We then visited an Aboriginal health research center, and learned about the cultural values of the Aboriginal people and the challenges of implementing large-scale cohort studies.