Domo arigato Mr Maloney

Today was going to be a relaxing travel day,. I mean, we only had a three hour flight from Taipei to Tokyo. What could be more restful?

That's not quite how things played out, which is part of the adventure of travel.

The day started well, waking early in our beautifully modern Taipei hotel room. I bounded jauntily down to breakfast and restrained myself from consuming mass quantities, apart from a heaped plate of Bread Pudding of course, knowing there were multiple eating options to come, particularly at the opulent China Airlines Business Class lounge at Taipei airport.

Checking out of the Hotel Indigo North I ordered an Uber to take us the 60km to Taoyuan Airport and was delighted when a Tesla Model 3 arrived. Being China, or Chinese Taipei, naturally the driver had decided Elon hadn't tricked this ride out quite enough, so he had pimped the door handles and added plenty of light up USB connections.

In 45 minutes we arrived at the airport, checked in, after the attendant had managed to extract the Visit Japan Web QR codes from my phone. (more on that later) we had breezed through customs (take note Auckland!!!) and strolled our way expectantly towards the business lounge. This is when the day took a detour.

This trip we were flying out of Taoyuan Terminal 2. On our previous Taipei visit we had gone out of Terminal 1. The business class lounges in the two terminals are not the same, in the same way that a Suzkuki Swift and a Lamborghini Aventador are not the same. They are both cars, but..... you get the point. The China Airlines lounge in Terminal 2 is like a bunker. I kept expecting Kim Jong Un to pop up and say 'Hi guy, relax!' It's a long low featureless hall with a sparse food selection and no ambience, and Terry wants his ambience! ;)

After enduring this lounge disappointment for as long as I could (I know, 1st World problems) I petulantly strutted out and boarded the flight bound for Tokyo. The flight was comfortable and uneventful and I managed to just fit in watching 'The Whale' (okay, but not Oscar-worthy) before we were landing at Narita International in Tokyo.

Remember that Visit Japan Web QR code I mentioned earlier? I had spent over an hour back in NZ dutifully filling out the forms and checking everything, so I was fully prepared when we arrived at immigration. I had the QR code on my phone screen and was ready to whip it out and gleefully say 'dozo'.

They didn't even ask for it! What the actual F?!! Come on Japan, stop messing with me. I just know somewhere, behind a screen, there is a little Japanese man laughing his arse off cackling, 'We fooled another one. Stupid gaijin!'

After clearing immigration, we collected our suitcases and headed into Arrivals to be picked up by the ride I had booked. The driver messaged me with a picture of where to meet. Hilariously, the picture had him at a different terminal. The next 45 minutes had me playing peek-a-boo via messaging to try and have us both at the same location, so he could actually drive us to our Disney hotel.

Finally he arrived at the correct door and we followed him out to what I expected to be a shuttle van. Boy was I surprised when he ushered us to his Volkswagen Golf.

Our driver turned out to be a young Chinese guy who is working the driver gig as a second job. We had a great conversation as he drove us the 60+ kms to the Tokyo Disneyland area and our hotel.

Just after 7pm (after starting our 'relaxed' travel day at 6am) we arrived at the Tokyo DisneySea Hotel Miracosta. This was worth the hassle of today. It is incredibly impressive, in a way only Disney can manage.

We checked in, which somehow took 20 minutes, and spent the next 15 minutes drooling over all the Disney detailing in our room and the eye-popping view from our window. This hotel is actually inside Tokyo DisneySea, so we look out onto the park. A-maz-ing!

Tomorrow we are up early to get to the gates of Tokyo Disneyland and make the most of our first Happy Entry. I know how that sounds! :0Read more