...we are FINALLY at our hotel, the sunroute plaza shinjuku!!! here's a little recap ;)
our first flight to chicago was at 6am. it was awesome flying into chicago though because it was still dark, so the city looked amazing!
we went to toronto after the chicago flight, so i snapped a few pics there too
our plane to japan!
first of all, let me just say how awesome air canada is. we each get TWO free bags we can check (perfect for the souvineers we'll be bringing back haha), the seats were relatively large, they are all super friendly and the food was awesome!
oh, and each seat has it's own entertainment center with movies, music, etc. all included
how awesome?!
anyway, we left canada for our 12 hour plane ride to japan. it was loooong, but we slept through some of it. we woke up for the amazing food though!
us getting ready to take-off!
byebye, canada!
green tea with delicious cornchips with sesame seeds on them
our dinner :) SO yummy! beef with rice and veggies
snack: sammich with ramen and yummy cranberry citrus cookies!
and breakfast! an omelet with potatoes and zuchinni
on the way, we flew over russia, and i got some amazing images! here are a couple:
it's cold up there!
LOVE this shot!
finally we start to land! and we start the long process of customs, getting our train tickets to tokyo, and checking into our hotel
helloooo, japan!
our train tickets to get to our hotel in shinjuku
the train we took: the narita express
uhm...this should be easy
sad and gloomy train ride into tokyo. go away rain!!!
our hotel room! complimentary jammies!
we get one of those awesome toilets that have all the buttons on the side
and there's vending machines down the hall!
"what's so special about that?", you say?
these vending machines give you beer!
and fun japanese drinks!
and a special water i think i might actually have to try haha
our japanese monies
and complimentary slippers that dont fit haha
well, that's all (and i suppose that's a lot!). it's 8:48pm right now and we feel like we could pass out at any minute from all the traveling. tomorrow i think it's supposed to rain again, but we'll go out anyways and see tokyo!!! nitenite!
im glad you guys made it 26 hours without losing your mind [or being forced to watch wild west ROR]
ReplyDeleteugh, but you got ramen?! sounds like torture to me--- huaahh huuuaahhh haha
gosh your cammy takes such lovely pics! i cant wait to get one! and i cant wait to see all those cherry blossom pictures.
quit having giant american feets! hehehe and how was the japanese beers?
So glad you arrived safely! Can't wait for future updates. Love you! XO
ReplyDeleteIs it true the toilets play music? lol i heard from a bird this is true........watch out for the water jets!
ReplyDeleteSo glad you made it there safely! Have a great time.
ReplyDeletethanks everyone! :D we are having such a blast so far! and laura, it's sort of true! maybe others play actual music, but the one in our hotel, and the one i used in a department store both made a "flushing" sound (electronically) so that people can't hear you go to the bathroom! it's crazy!
ReplyDeletewe stayed at hearton too XDDD
ReplyDeletebut the rooms were so small >.< glad you arrived safe!! XDDDD
*now i'm jealous!* XDDD
love the new suica cards for persons from outside Japan...
ReplyDeleteThis blog is awesome. My wife and I are planning to do a similar trip in September 2010(coincidentally staying at the same hotel!) and this is a great preview for us.
ReplyDeleteWe'll be sure to post some questions for you ;)
i'm glad you enjoy it!!! :) feel free to ask me any questions. and you can e-mail them to me too if you would like! jtont02@gmail.com :)
ReplyDeleteyou will have an amazing time there!
Hi Jacqui - I am not sure if you are still checking comment posts on your blog but I stumbled upon it whilst searching for advice on TripAdvisor! Me and my boyfriend Tim are travelling to Japan on 10 - 24 September and I would love to get your advice on tran travel.
ReplyDeleteI have loved reading your blog and have already made a list of all the places you guys visited so that we can do the same!
I didn't want to email you out of the blue (I see you left your email for someone else above) so let me know if it would be ok to get in touch and I'll send you a note.
Thanks!
Fiona
hey fiona!
ReplyDeleteyes! please feel free to e-mail me! :) i'd love to help you with your trip however i can! :D
talk to you soon!
Fab - thanks! will email you with our list of questions (!!) in the next day or so.
ReplyDeleteThanks Jacqui :-)
Fiona
Muslims who would like to travel in cheap are offered Cheap Umrah Packages for their benefits by the UK airlines.
ReplyDeleteHi Jacqui,
ReplyDeleteI am not sure if you still check this blog and see this message. I am planning to go to Japan this March/April for 2 weeks, similar timing like yours. Just wondering about the weather and what to pack. Also this Sunroute Plaza Hotel, what room type did you book and whether the basic room is enough or need to upgrade. We plan to travel light (save luggage for shopping). We read your whole blog and I will just go to places you've been to in this blog including the hotels in Shinjuku and Kobe.
For Kobe, do you have any reasons why you've stayed at Kobe instead of staying all the way in Osaka, since the distance is quite short anyway by train (15 mins)?
Thanks.
hi! yes, i still get e-mail notifications :) i'm so jealous of you! you will have the BEST time :) the weather is kinda cold. we both wore jackets almost every day. i remember the first day was REALLY cold, and rainy, but we we out to explore anyway of course haha...i think we wore short sleeves underneath though in case we got too hot. and brought a few thin long-sleeve shirts too. ROLL your clothes when you pack. did i talk about that in this blog? i can't remember. but we went to japan a second time in july/august 2011, and i talked about rolling clothes for packing and saving space.
Deletehttp://japanniversaryinjuly.blogspot.com/2011/07/packing-up-and-one-unhappy-siamese.html
so there is another blog about another trip to japan we had if you want to read that one too! haha :)
as for the sunroute, we just got a basic room. we wanted to save as much money as possible because we would be in japan for 3 weeks. LOVE the sunroute though, and we stayed there our second trip too. would easily be our first choice when we go back someday. it's a small room, but, you are out and about all day anyway, so who cares! ;)
i forget why we chose to stay in kobe for a few nights...i think just because we wanted a couple of days to explore that area, the hotel was suggested to us, and we had reservations already at that ume no hana private room place.
Hi Jacqui, thanks for replying!
DeleteAt Sunroute, we will just get the Economy Double room, I think that is the lowest and with breakfast, only add $10/day, I think would be worth it. And for Kobe, I can only find Standard Queen City View room for the dates I am after, which is more expensive than the basic one, but that's my only option in that Crowne Plaza, and they do extra charge $35 for the 2nd adult :(. So at the end it costs $500 for 3 nights.
So our route is Kyoto 5 nights -> Kobe 3 nights -> Gamagori 1 night -> Tokyo 6 nights. In Kyoto I will just stay in a bargain hostel, though because of the date we will be travelling is high season, so the price is still a little above $100. So I am tossing between staying in Kyoto for total 8 nights or Kyoto 5 nights and Kobe 3 nights.
Oh and where did you have those food, like gyoza at Akaman, Ume No Hana Restaurant (how to do reservation and may I know how much the cost is), also Grill Miyata at Kyoto.
At the end, did you go to Nikko? If you did, how early do you think I should leave the hotel (Sunroute Plaza) and where to buy the All Nikko Pass? I just don't want to end up to be too late like what happened to you. Is it worth going though? Did you also go to Disneyland and Disney Sea? I have so many places I want to visit but with limited time!
Thanks.
the breakfast at the sunroute was just so-so. we just ate that yummy breakfast bread from 7-11 or other convenient stores every day with coffee (that i'm sure you saw the pictures of). cheap, and delicious :) we actually really miss that a lot!!!
Deletewe had the queen room at the kobe hotel, but, we booked the basic one, and when we got there, they upgraded us for free! not sure if it was because it was our honeymoon, or what, but it was great! very nice, spacious room.
we had the same problem with kyoto. we wanted to stay there, but everything was booked except super expensive places.
i unfortunately cannot remember exactly where akaman was :( i just looked for it, and i can't find it. it was a really hole-in-the-wall type place and they didn't speak ANY english haha...sooooo that part was hard. they kept asking us questions in japanese, and i didn't know enough to answer them. but, they just ended up giving us gyoza somehow lol...
for ume no hana, if you google this address on google maps (梅の花 神戸元町店, NOF神戸海岸ビル 15F, ３番地 Kaigandori, KobeChuo Ward, Hyogo Prefecture, Japan) you will find it. it's the letter "A". unfortunately we had someone in japan offer to make the reservations for us, but, if you contact your kobe hotel, they will do it for you. they made reservations for us for somewhere else. very nice! i can't remember how much it cost (sorry, i'm not being very helpful!).
grill miyata....ohhhh so amazing. but, i just found out that it looks like they closed up on april 30th of last year :( i'm so sorry!!! the owner was really old, and when we saw him in august 2011, he was doing much worse than when we saw him in april 2010.
we ended up not going to nikko at all. not even during our 2nd trip. we just decided to skip it on our second trip too. i dunno...maybe one day, but, it seemed like a lot of time/work to get there, and we just decided we didnt want to use up a whole day on it. we also never went to disney land/sea. we have a 6 month old daughter now though, so one day when we go back, i'm sure we'll go there! :)