Getting There

Looking down at the ground over Hokkido

On Tuesday night, we left for the airport. We stayed at a hotel so we could get up in time to catch the airplane. Our Chicago flight left at 6am. The two hour flight landed at 7am Chicago time. We had almost four hours until the flight to Tokyo left. When we finally boarded the 777 jet, I thought it was huge. I got a window seat. The flight was thirteen hours long, so we had a long time to wait. The planes entertainment system was amazing. Each seat had its own screen. You could pick from a list of movies or games. Also, there was a camera on the bottom of the plane so you could see what you were flying over. The plane took us over some great lakes, over Canada, over Alaska, over the Arctic Circle, over Russia and finally landed at
Narita Airport. A funny thing was that the day moved with us, so it was always light outside. It landed at 1:30pm Japan time, which was about midnight CT time, so we were exhausted. I couldn’t sleep on the plane.

Our traditional style Japanese guest room. Futons on the
floor and pillows filled with plastic beans.

After going through customs and immigration, we took two different trains to Hamamatsu, got settled in out room, and had dinner. An odd thing was that just as I was getting settled on my futon, I didn’t feel tired anymore. This was because it was now morning time in Storrs. After a while, I finally got to sleep.