Well, that’s it, the good times are over—time to head back home. Today’s going to be quite the journey. We got up at 6 AM to get ready and leave the hotel around 6:45. Then, we walked a solid 15 minutes to the metro and took the red line to Shin-Osaka station, where you catch the Shinkansen. For some reason, when I booked this hotel, I didn’t realize that there were several stations called Osaka, and I ended up picking the wrong one. Oh well, lesson learned!
Anyway, we took the metro to the train station, got there with plenty of time, so we grabbed some Starbucks coffee to wake up and kill time. At 8:05 sharp—because, of course, trains in Japan are never late—our bullet train left, and by 10:30, we were in Tokyo Station. The train is amazing. And Mount Fuji? Still hiding behind the clouds. Bad luck! Well, I guess that gives us an excuse to come back.
As soon as we got off the train, about five minutes later, Olivia realized she had left her Nintendo on board. She ran back to get it, but by then, the train was already closed. Luckily, since this was the final stop, the staff found it, so we just had to go to the lost-and-found office and, after a short wait, they handed it back to us safe and sound. Gotta love Japan.
Next, we asked one of the station staff for help buying our airport train tickets because I just couldn’t figure it out on my own (it’s honestly not that easy). He suggested taking the 12:00 train instead of the 11:30 one since we were cutting it a bit close. We probably would have made it, but with the insane crowds and the sheer size of the station, it was better to play it safe. Speaking of which—so. many. people. Everywhere. I can’t even imagine what it’s like to travel in India…
So, we took the Narita Express at noon and arrived at Terminal 1 a little before 1 PM. At this point, we were a bit tight on time for check-in and boarding since our flight was at 3:15 PM. Fingers crossed! The process was simple enough—just look for the airline (Air China, Terminal 1 South), go up four floors, find the check-in counter, and wait in line. I tried to check in online but failed miserably, so we had to do it the old-fashioned way. After almost half an hour, we finally got our boarding passes. Immigration control was a breeze—just scan your passport, do a facial recognition check (I assume based on the photo they took when we arrived in Japan), and that’s it.
We spent our last yen before boarding and ended up with 20 minutes to spare (thank God I moved our Shinkansen tickets an hour earlier, or we might not have made it!).
Now, off to Beijing, with a seven-hour layover—ugh. Let’s see if we can get our Madrid boarding passes sorted there because they’ve seated the three of us separately, and 12 hours alone might be a bit much for the kids.
The layover was uneventful. First, we looked for a counter to see if they could rearrange our seats, but the only people willing to help (in the business class area) told us the flight was full and it was unlikely anyone could switch with us. So, nothing we could do. We had a Pizza Hut dinner (which was pretty bad, by the way), and Olivia went for spaghetti with meatballs, which were actually pretty good.
Time dragged on… An hour before departure, we headed to the gate, and boarding had already started. Here we go.
When we got to our seats, there was some serious confusion—no idea if someone had taken the wrong spot or what, but in the end, we managed to sit more or less together. Now, all that’s left is to sit back, relax, and wait for the flight to be over.