November 12 - Day 1 The Trip Over

Grandma Rich took us to the airport EARLY, then she and Grandpa Ben headed to Wendover.  We got our three little bags checked, then headed through security and to our gate.  We had plenty of time to spare, so I went for a walk and got this picture of a plane and Payson's TIGER.  Grandma Carol was sending it to him (as he had misplaced his other tiger).  He was so excited to have us (and the tiger) come, that Landon requested that we send pictures of US, and PLANE, and the TIGER, so they could show him we were on our way :)

On the first leg of our trip to LA, some idiot put their coffee mug in the overhead, and during the flight it started dripping down on the lady in front of us.  The flight attendants worked to remedy the situation.  The little family in front of us, a young couple with three kids, and a set of grandparents were on their way to Disneyland.  Apparently they had woken up that morning, and told the kids.  The little boy who was about 3-4 was SO excited.  He kept saying in a LOUD VOICE, "I can't believe we are going to DISNEYLAND!!!!   This is going to be SO NEAT !!!!!!"   It was pretty cute :)

We made it to LAX, and had a short layover there before boarding our 747 to taken us 11+ hours across the ocean to Japan on the 2nd leg of our journey.  

The seats had video monitors on them, and we had a wide selection of games, music, movies, and could also track the progress of our flight.  There were 9 seats across 3, aisle, 3, aisle, 3.  Roger and I had an empty seat between us, which was nice.  Mauricio had booked it that way, in hopes that no one would take it, and they didn't ! 

Here is our little menu - both in English and Japanese, and Chinese? mayber.........  The food was pretty good.  We had a meal, and then a lighter meal/snack later in the flight.  You can see in the red at the bottom, the flight track, and the "spacing" of the meals, beverages, etc. so you knew what was going to happen.  They also passed out little "hot moist towlets" a couple of times, just before the meals, so we could refresh ourselves.  Neither one of us got much (if any) sleep.  I bet I started (then discarded) 10 movies......  They had a pretty good selection of some quite current releases, along with some good old classics, ranging from drama to horror to western and more.  Rog was hoping he could play his computer games on his tablet, but they wouldn't work without WIFI.  During the flight, and when meals weren't being served, they turned the lights down really low so people could sleep.  Outside, the sun never set.  We left LA at about 10:30 am, and almost 12 hours later, the sun was still up as we landed in Tokyo (Narita airport) at about 3pm.  We crossed the international date line, and it was now Thursday (not Wednesday anymore). 

Yep, this is the coast of Japan !

This time Grandpa gets his picture taken while on a moving walkway.  I was able to send it off to Payson with the WIFI supplied at the airport.  Rog and I were able to use the internet for emailing and uploading to Facebook and the blog whenever we had a WIFI connection.  

While waiting in the Narita airport (2.5 hr layover) , I had Rog buy me what we THOUGHT was a water.  I made a post on Facebook, about it, knowing that it was now about 12am in the states, and no one would see the post till morning.  I was surprised when someone replied back almost immediately !  It was Norris Porter, Roger's 2nd cousin, and former classmate (Class of 1976 - Morgan High), and fellow Porterville -ite! who was now living in Atlanta Georgia area.  He informed me it was for sure water.....then asked, "Where are you?"   When I told he, he said, "SO AM I!".  What a small world it really is.    He was traveling home, after a month in Japan for his job.  He came down to our gate, and we had a 15 minute conversation before our plane started boarding.  I took a picture of he and Roger D., but I'm still getting used to my new phone camera, and it was a total bomb :(

Well - that's our first day !  We traveled from Japan to Manila, and got in about 11pm, before heading to our hotel (Hotel Remington).  It was a little nerve wracking, getting our luggage, and finding a shuttle, and getting to our hotel in a foreign country.  The ride to our hotel was uneventful, and it was very close to the terminal we had arrived at.   Everyone speaks English, so that really wasn't an issue, but it was just nerve wracking none the less.  When we got to our hotel, and received our key cards we headed to the elevator.  It was a good thing about 3 young men (teenagers) were there, and they helped us INSERT our room key card in order for us to be able to press the floor we wanted.  We felt very foolish and out of our element.  And then again when we got to our room (it was nice), we could not get the lights to turn on.....  I finally had to call the front desk, and they asked me if we had INSERTED THE KEY CARD (once again), to the little "thingy" in our wall, which then allowed the lights to work !    Another first for us.   We got some much needed sleep (it was now 5am in the states, and we had been up for 26 hours at this point).