Japan and U.S. Domestic Travel Blog

Travel blog, starting with a trip to Japan March 20, 2010 through April 4, 2010 and continuing through both local and long-distance travel thereafter.

Thursday, September 5, 2019

Day 1 - Family Japan - "Arrival and Tokyo Tower"

Day 1 (December 13/14, 2018 with time jump)

The adventure begins! The day began at home with last minute packing and some slight panicking.  We left for the airport at 8:30AM and arrived shortly before 9AM.  Good thing too as the security lines were long, without enough lanes open.  We managed through it all, grabbed breakfast and were at our gate by 11:15AM for the 11:45AM boarding call.  We opted to pay extra from the nonstop flight (the same timing as the flight we took in 2010). It was an ANA flight, but serviced by United, which meant a lot apparently.

Flight boarded and took off without issue.  Within an hour or so, we realized the grave mistake of not bringing food with us.  When we took this same flight, but fully serviced by ANA, they had meal order options (Japanese and American), snacks and beverages. However, this time around we were informed there would only be one meal service about 2 hours into the flight, one free snack (spicy Asian mix) and another meal/snack combo 2 hours before landing.  There was no opportunity to order anything extra and no real "kid-friendly" options. During the flight we also ended up receiving a very cold sandwich somewhere in between, but the calorie count for a 14 hours flight must have been in the 500-600 range total, with all of the food qualifying as mediocre, Terra ate even less than we did. At least we had plenty of entertainment options with the laptop (Netflix downloads included), 2 Switches, 3DS, Tablets and more.  Terra might have slept 2 or 3 hours total and we each took one or two cat naps.  Overall, the flight was one of the smoothest I've ever experience with minimal turbulence and behavior, given the situation, was good.  It was an impressive display on one of the most difficult parts of the trip.

Upon arrival, there was (of course) more lines and waiting, but everything went off without a hitch. Getting through immigration, baggage, customs and then finding an ATM to grab some yen and hitting up the JR East exchange office to get our passes were next on the agenda. Getting our Narita express tickets to get to Tokyo and the Shinkansen tickets for the following day was a breeze.

What ensued from there was a semi-chaotic scramble to the Narita express, back off after another Terra cat nap, off and through our first stop at Tokyo Station DURING RUSH HOUR, which is HEAVILY under construction right now (I assume for the Olympic renovations) and on to the Yamanote line to get to Shimbashi, the nearest stop to our hotel for the night.  Oh, little did I realize how INSANE Shimbashi would be during Friday night rush hour (it was 6:45PM local at this point).  If the station was crazy, outside was slightly short of insane (Izakaya, "hotels" and host clubs galore) and it was pretty cold at 40F or so.  We had 2 large suitcases, one small and one backpack roller at this point, which added to the chaos.  Oh, how I wish we could travel with less luggage.

A "quick" 10 minute walk (only almost getting hit by cars twice!) and we arrive at Park Hotel Tokyo.  I found out while booking our airline tickets, that it actually makes the entire trip cheaper to bundle a hotel with them (even for only one of the twenty nights!) and this was a top rated location, making it an obvious choice. The service lady caught us getting off the elevator and IMMEDIATELY assisted.  Service in Japan never ceases to amaze me and the fact that they aren't after tip money is always astounding as well.  She grabbed our luggage, walked us up to check-in and then to our room all while speaking decent English.  This service was furthered as when the toilet was clogged, they had someone in our room within 5 minutes, a plumber accompanied by a bellhop, and fixed it quickly with a smile on their face.  A similar problem in a U.S. hotel would have taken forever and "those looks" from a maintenance man that might finally arrive to "maybe" fix the issue (I know, it's happened before). I was immediately happy that we paid for the upgraded "Tokyo Tower" view room as once Terra saw it, we knew we'd have the energy to head back out and on to our first real vacation experience.


We grab a taxi waiting outside the hotel, 780 yen and one mile of driving later we were at the foot of the tower in less than 10 minutes.  It was exactly as expected as "another tower view", the Christmas light displays (in Tokyo Tower orange and white) were cool, the night view with clear weather was nice and there was a pretty standard shopping mall and food court inside.  We decided not to go to the very top deck as it was under construction and an additional cost. The "One Piece" area of tower was also an additional cost, and since none of us were huge fans of the series, we opted out of a visit inside that section as well.

The first souvenirs were purchased at the top floor gift shop and then we headed to the food court for some standard Japanese "fast food".  Entering this floor, we were already greeted by Japanese commercialism (anime figures for sale at the shops and very Japanese displays as seen here)! Terra grabbed a kids burger meal at MOS burger while Matt and myself opted for Ramen and Katsu curry from one of the other food court restaurants. I immediately noticed surrounding us (on a Friday night, which we were too foggy headed to remember at the time) were a lot of kids!  During our 2010 trip, I swear we might have only seen two or three kids total.  Maybe it was the change in circumstances (having a kid now myself) or simply the location and date, but I was surprised.

Most of the tower was closing by the time we finished eating, so it was time to head back and try to get some sleep.  We got Shinkansen tickets for 8AM the next day, which in hindsight might have been a bit overzealous. We had a few failed attempts at hailing a taxi (both manually and by using an app for the first time) and ended up walking the mile back to the hotel in the chilly windy weather.  A few quick showers, a makeshift sleeping area on the floor for Terra and we were all done for the night. Sleep was much easier than I remember it being on our first trip in 2010, I think Terra racked up 6 or 7 hours straight, Matt got at least 7 hours and I was at about 6 hours of broken sleep after waking up twice for no reason.  So far, we were off to a great start.

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