We Made It!

Jeff and I got up and made it out the door by about 9am and were on the bus by about 9:15am, a bit later than we had originally planned. We got to the airport at about 10:30, mind you our flight left at 11:30am! We tried to get there with more time but I swear every single handicap person decided to get on the bus which made it take forever... Once we actually got there we were so stressed and did everything we could to try and get through the gates faster, no luck. The woman at the gate told us not to stress her out or start her day off wrong... We also got a lecture about arriving earlier - WE TRIED! After much stress and time, we made it through securirty, ran toi the tram, then bolted up 3 flights of stairs taking them 2 at a time (thank god for all that exercise) and then finally arriving at our gate!

The flight from Seattle to Vancouver was on a 50 person Dash 8 airplane... I had the joy of being assigned to sit next to "Larry Petersen", the space hog! Firs I am sure you are wondering why his name is in quotes. He was a persian man with a thick accent named "Larry Peterson"... right. Jeff and I decided he must he in witness protection. As for the space hog part, it's a small plane and he decided to take up 90% of the space under the seats for his bag so I had no room for mine, I even said something to him and he ignored me, full on ignored me. Thankfully the plane didn't fill up so I moved to another row, Jeff joined me.

Our flight left a few minutes late b/c "Larry" had some issues with his seat assignment, apparently he and some other guy were both assigned to that seat - which apparentloy isn't possible. He ended up getting the seat, the other guy had to ride in a different one, and we finally took off.

Once we got on our flight bound for Tokyo we were happy to find out we had an exit row with tons of leg room. There was a woman eyeing our extra middle seat for quite sometime. I told Jeff to cough and look sick so that she wouldn't come sit with us. Having that free seat is like gold so we were hoping to keep it all to ourselves. Bad I know but I think you would have done the same... It's a 9.5 hour flight, that extra seat was a bonus... It wasn't a full flight either, there were plenty of free seats all over. I did see the woman later ask a flight attendant about moving and the flight attendant told her she shouldn't b/c "they're together" YAY, thanks stewardess!!! That put an end to it and we didn't have to do a thing.

There was a lot of turbulance at the beginning of the flight so the beverage and food service was delayed. After quite sometime they decided to just feed us anyway b/c people were pretty hungry. We had the chicken, my favorite was the dessert - chocolate mousse. Jeff started off with a bloody marry and I had some white wine. Drinks were free!! We had a few more throughtout the flight and they served us dinner too, beef and rice.

One thing that is so cute is that most of the Japanese people on the flight have slippers they are wearing around. The kick off their shoes and then slip into their airplane slippers and scout around in them. The bathroom door also seems to be a source of confusment for them as pretty much every person goes and fumbles with it before finally figuring it out or gives up until they see someone come out.

We landed around 3:40pm, breezed through immigration and customs, then had to figure out where terinal 2 was so we could pick up our rail passes. I did have to ask but the guy was supoer nice and helpful.

We found terminal 2 and the pass place. I showed the lady my google map to get to our hotel and she laughed, apparently google maps did not give me the quickest route. She did though.The train was pretty easy to figure out once she told us which direction to go, everything is labeled in english which is beyond helpful!! Our train ride from Narita to Shibuya was abot 1.5 hours and we rode backwards (oh and I think it smelled port o potty like)... I wasn't feeling so hot at the end, can't say I liked that. Once at Shibuya we transfered trains and that wasn't to bad. We arrived at Ebisu and that is where the confusion kicked in. It was rush hour so there were alot of people... We still aren't sure how to get out of the station, we just kind of followed other people out yet they were scanning something to exit... not sure what though. Then we got all directionally challenged and I kept reminding Jeff of my compass and he kind of poo pooped it at first buit then after a brief stressful stint got it worked out. I kepot saying I hoped we'd see the Westin sign in the sky but was skeptical since the buildings were pretty tall... But then off in the distance when I was about to silentloy freak out I saw the beautiful Westin sign and we both sighed a breathe of relief. We relaxed a bit and took our time walking there.

The hotel is beautiful and by far will be the nicest place we stay... I think. Now it is time to shower and clean up a bit then head out for "dinner" - we re trying to get on the schedule here so it won't screw us up on time... Ok, that's it for now. Time to get clean up and then explore. More later!!!