Welcome to Japan

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Well, I am here, and loving every minute of it so far.


This is the first time I've managed to find a decent computer and upload the blog, so hopefully I'll manage to get this updated a lot more as time goes by, and maybe get some photo's uploaded as well.




The trip




Thanks to Richard, for giving me the lift to the airport on Saturday morning. Also to Kerry for getting up at 4:30 and making us breakfast, I'm going to miss you guys.




The trip down to the airport went really well, it was a nice easy drive down and the roads were nice and clear. Managed to get to the airport for just after 7am, with the flight not leaving till 10am, so a fair bit of time to gather myself together and get myself awake.




Checking in, went nice and smooth, apart from after checking my bag, the guy on the desk told me that I needed to get my bag in South Korea, and check it in again. I've never known this, after all the flights I've taken, so wasn't sure if the guy was correct or not. I then sat and listened to music for a while, while waiting to board the flight to Paris.




The flight to Paris went as smooth, think probably too tired to pay any attention to it, but had a row of 3 sears with just myself and 1 other guy, so a bit of room to relax, although it wasn't really much of a flight.




The time in Paris went really quick, the transfer between flights after de-boarding and making my way to the new flight meant that it was pretty much straight onto the next flight. The next flight, to South Korea was not so great, the row of 3 turned into 3 full seats, and the guy next to me was a bit of a dick. He initially started out in the seats behind me, as he just thought that ignoring the assigned seats would get him a row on his own. He got moved when the people that were supposed to be sat there turned up, and then came and sat between myself and the Korean guy in the third seat. He wasn't a particularly big guy, but he just manged to always be expanded into the seats around him. I'm glad I managed to slim down a bit before the trip, or we'd have been bumping guts in the seats.

The transfer in South Korea didn't really go smoothly. The bags, which I had been told to pick up didn't arrive on the conveyor, it would certainly explain why the guy on immigration looked at me gone out when I announced my "length of stay" at around 2 hours. Still, I managed to get a stamp in the passport and a quick 15 minute walk around outside the airport.



The last leg of the journey, South Korea to Japan was wonderful. I was sat around 3 rows from the back of the plane, and every seat behind me was full of an air hostess coming back from away. I was all alone, surrounded by so many stunning women that I wondered if I'd died and gone to heaven.



Arriving in Japan was nice and easy, quick form filled in, and stamp in the passport. I was now officially "on holiday". Did have a scare on the way to the passport desk, as little old Japanese lady fell down the escalator behind me. She was doing the flopping fish at the bottom, trying her best to get up, until I hoisted her up and saved the day. She didn't weigh much, poor thing.

The train journey into Tokyo went really easy, I acquired my Suica and Nex card from the JR office, as well as doing my JR pass, then jumped onto a train. Trains here are so clean, and punctual. I think our shitty rail service should come here to learn a few lessons.

The Suica and Nex card is like an Oyster Card, you charge some money onto it, then just swipe it at entry/exit points and it works out the charge and deducts it.



I was staying in the Ace Inn, in Shinjuku. It's really near a subway station, 2 stops away from Shinjuku so I had my first bit of learning how the subways work.



The subways in Tokyo are a breeze to work out, once you have a decent map and understand the system. There are 3 signs on most of the subway maps, colour - which signifies the line name, a letter which also signifies the line name and then a number. The number is the stop number (makes it very easy to know when your stop is coming up next). You just work out where you want to go, then jump across the different lines at different stations until you get there. The JR lines are occasionally different as you'll have to leave their network to join the standard metro lines (but not always).



Anyway, finally at the hostel.

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