Thought this was the case

I had thought that this was the case - as so many friends and relatives have been to Japan in the last decade, whereas it had not seemed to be that big a destination for Australian tourists 25 years ago. 

Here's an article at the ABC putting numbers on my suspicions, and confirming them.   Australian and Japanese tourist numbers have changed dramatically:

Well before China's economic growth drove its citizens to seek out Australian beaches and koala cuddling sessions, it was Japanese tourists filling the pockets of operators in the 1980s and '90s.

The peak was in 1997 when more than 814,000 made the journey south.

Two decades later, in 2016, the number was basically half, with only 417,900 making the same trip.

By comparison, in 1997 some 101,460 Australians made the trek to Japan, of which just 41,520 were tourists.

By 2016 the number had sky rocketed to 445,237 — of which 398,193 were tourists. That's a 959 per cent increase in the number of Australians taking a holiday in Japan over just two decades.