OK, more pictures, less snark. Comments will be added later.

OK, it’s later now. Off to Japan again which means getting up at 4am for the 7am flight to Seattle. The reason I fly Delta and pay almost $700 per year for a special AMEX card is so I can have access to the lounge. The waffle was “vegetarian” which means it was made of cardboard and I couldn’t eat it. The rest was fine. Sausage, fruit, eggs, potato, and coffee.

I figured Seattle would be rainy and it didn’t disappoint.

Watched several bad movies (and a good one) on the 11-or-so hours to Japan. Dune 2, The Fall Guy, Bad Boys: Ride or Die, Monkey Man, and because of a glitch I only was able to watch part of Hocus Pocus. Hocus Pocus was darker than I expected.

After we arrived and got our bags, we shipped gift packages from Haneda Airport to our friends so we wouldn’t have to carry them around with us. I never hand-write anything anymore and I was having a heck of a time writing kanji and then I found out that Yamato changed their rules and they now let people write addresses in English. Not only that but you can just enter in the addresses at a tablet at the counter. We had seven (?) packages so filling out the forms beforehand was better. My sister stood in line and I filled out forms and by the time I was done she was finally at the front of the line.

I also found out I could just drop off my luggage at the ANA counter next to the Yamato counter so we didn’t have to carry all the luggage on the shuttle bus from Terminal 3 (int’l) -> Terminal 1 (most domestic plus the post office I usually use) -> Terminal 2 (ANA). And unlike the past few times I rode the bus, it wasn’t packed.

We went to check out the restaurants but ended up at the coffee shop I like. It’s out of the way and usually not crowded. I got Japanese Napolitan spaghetti and my sister had the carbonara. By this time I’d been up for over 24 hours so here’s a picture of when I remembered to take it (after I’d already eaten most of it). It’s not what the Italians would call proper spaghetti (or Americans, either) but I like it.

It was raining so hard that flights were delayed throughout Japan. I guess even the Shinkansen had service halted. I fell asleep waiting, and I fell asleep as soon as I got on the plane. I woke up an hour later and thought I must’ve slept through the flight but we were still taxiing! I only woke up long enough to get my free small cup of juice (they often offer juice or tea). The flight to Toyama was under an hour.

I’m not sure why, but there’s always ads on the conveyor belt and in Toyama there were giant sushi!

Our friend met us and drove us to our hotel by Toyama station. And that’s the trip to Japan!