Japan day 1: We’re going on an adventure!
With the immortal words of Martin Freeman from The Hobbit in mind, we embarked on our big trip to Japan! After planning everything out as best as we could, and filling out the required quarantine and immigration paperwork for Japan, we made our way to SeaTac, breezed through security (middle of a Monday is an odd time for travel, I guess), and killed a bit of time at the new Amex lounge. It has much more space than the old lounge, but it was fairly busy nonetheless. However, we had no trouble grabbing a table for a light lunch and some coffee.
We made our way to the S gates and boarded our plane on time. Luckily, we were able to score business class seats on points (part of why we left on a Monday), though we ended up with the old herringbone rather than the fancy Apex suites. They have almost no storage by the seat, and it feels just a bit cramped compared to the newer design. Of course, it’s still business class, so I really shouldn’t complain:
We got a second lunch only a few hours after our lounge meal, and it was delicious! We both opted for the Japanese menu, which involved lots of delicate, tasty bites.
The in-flight entertainment was pretty glitchy, with the movie cutting in and out. Thankfully, we had brought our ipads, and Jerry spent most of his time knitting anyway.
Even the toilets on this JAL flight were nice; they all had a Japanese bidet function. Neither of us can confirm if the toilet seat was heated though.
Upon arrival, the immigration line wasn’t bad, and since we’d pre-registered (on the admittedly awful website), everything went very smoothly. Picking up the JR pass took a while, and we got crazy confused trying to get tickets for the Narita Express, but after everything, we got a lovely sunset train ride through the farmland in Chiba prefecture.
We closed out the day with a delightful dinner at the hotel lounge, with great views of the skyscrapers out the window. Weirdly, we went with pretty western fare after all the Japanese food on the plane.
Tomorrow and the day after we are going to explore Tokyo with Nick’s family, so stay tuned for more updates!
