We packed up the last of our stuff and headed for the airport at about 8:30am. After a stop at the bank and the gas station, we were on the road to the airport. It was morning rush hour so it took a bit over an hour to get to Toronto. We parked in the park and fly lot in Etobicoke and jumped in a shuttlebus to terminal one – Air Canada. Our shuttle bus was full to capacity with a family headed to Japan as well, and they were really loud and annoying and didn’t wear masks ( I can’t imagine they blended well into Japan as those things are so taboo in Japan).

We arrived at the airport just before noon and went through security with no issue. We made our way to our gate and ordered “Canadian” beer, which has become our new tradition. I thought I had heard our names being called over the speaker, so we processed to our gate area. The gate attendant said they needed to check our vaccination certificates. To enter Japan you needed to be vaccinated 3 times, (we had 5 shots at this point). We boarded the flight not long after. Even though Jives and I were in the same row, we had different boarding zones, we had also been seated in an aisle/ window seat so we weren’t actually sitting together. We ended up beside a really nice guy after a bit of shuffling, he was a manga artist making manga with Viz. He said that the manga he was working on was the first Viz North American collaboration. He had only ever been on one short flight, so he asked a lot of questions, but I was happy to share my extensive airplane experience with him. We had three of the worst vegetarian meals of my life on this flight, so I hardly ate anything. Air Canada really has some of the worst airplane food, especially if you are vegetarian. I watched Schitts Creek for the first time and then Kung Fu Hustle.

It was a direct flight, but torturously long at about 15 hours. We arrived at Narita at about 5pm, but they allowed all the people with connections to disembark first, which was pretty brilliant. There were still a lot of covid precautions in Japan at this point, you must fill out a form and present a QR code at three different stations. We then waited in line for immigration for about two hours with our bags on our backs, sweating through our many layers. After immigration we had to fill out customs forms, man does Japan love their forms. We then found the Keisei line to Tokyo and bought two tickets at 1100 yen each. This is the cheapest way to get to Tokyo from Narita airport, as we didn’t want to activate our JR rail passes until the next day. We jumped on a rapid train to Asukusa station. This train took over an hour, I think if you get on a limited express train it might be faster. This train line at least led right to where we had to go, Asakusa, where we were staying the night, without any transfers. We took exit A3 out of the station and walked out into the brisk night. It was about 1 degree celsius, but welcoming weather after sweating in lines for hours. 

We walked 8 minutes to our accommodation “Ryokan Tokyo Asakusa”. We checked in and paid 15,000 yen for one night. Our room was pretty traditional with a modern twist. The doors were all sliding screens and tatami mat floors.

We dropped our bags off and set out in search of a combini to grab some food and drinks. There was a 711 a few metres away. We got two onigiris, salmon and salt, some instant noodles and a few sours (I got a grapefruit one). We then wandered to the waterfront and saw the skytree all lit up along the Sumida River. We even saw a few plum blossoms peaking out. We then walked to our hotel and ate all our snacks. I convinced Jives to go on one last night time wander to Sensoji Temple.The shrine was 5 minutes away and beautifully lit up at night. I am so glad we went. We found an Inari Shrine on the temple grounds (we are on a side quest to find all the Inari Shrines we could in Japan, inspired by Ghost of Tsushima).

We then went back to our hotel via another combini and got ready for bed. I had a shower the traditional way, sitting on a stool with a bucket of water..it was so incredible. We then watched some TV (Japan is awesome) and went to sleep just after midnight.