Author archive
21 November 2023
Gotokuji Temple The target for the day was Gotokuji Temple, famous for its numerous maneki-neko or happy cat statuettes. We left the hotel at 0930 by train and arrived about an hour later. The forecast sunny weather appeared to be a lie when we arrived. Fortunately, the skies brightened up considerably towards the end of […]
20 November 2023
Smoke protection This morning, I noticed that the inside of my hotel room door had a plastic bag attached to it. Instructions suggested that it is to be used over the had, puffed out with air, during fire evacuation as protection from smoke. It really goes against all the things we’ve been taught with plastic […]
19 November 2023
Moving to Tokyo I woke around 0530 and met Alice for breakfast at 0700. We wanted to have a somewhat early start so we could get to Tokyo to meet Jacqueline who had come from Vancouver, so she wouldn’t be alone all day. We hopped on the 0917 JR train to the city and got […]
18 November 2023
As we descended into Tokyo Narita, I thought I caught a glimpse of a large white peak from the port side window. Fuji, I thought? Sunset was around 1630 in the area and it was pretty dark already. The pilot came on to give his landing announcement, partially in Japanese. We landed around 1725, some […]
18 November 2023
Flying out I got to Auckland airport around 2h30 before my 0955 flight to Tokyo. Kiosk check-in was not available for this flight, so I had to join the long queue which fortunately moved quite quickly. There were 10 counters for four flights. I was given a boarding pass straight away by the check-in agent […]
16 August 2023
It didn’t feel like I had slept after my inflight dinner but because time didn’t drag on, I must have dozed slightly. My slight sinus and cough from the previous days appear to have eased but the dry cabin air had given me a sore throat. I appear to have come a full circle as […]
15 August 2023
Leaving Kuching Today I leave Kuching for the journey back to Auckland, with a self-connect at Singapore. My brother dropped me off at Kuching airport around 0800 after a slow drive during rush hour. With no food outlets in the international section of the airport (apart from a sandwich stand, I later learnt), I ate […]
13 August 2023
I’m approaching the end of my stay in Kuching. This time it is a little different as I’ve given my up my apartment for eight of the ten nights to family visiting from Birmingham. I’m camping with my brother, sleeping on the mattress in the living room without aircon and having cold showers. During the […]
5 August 2023
Killing time Despite not having napped yesterday afternoon in order to encourage a good night sleep, it didn’t work. I’m not so good flying eastbound. Retiring at 2115 last night, I woke up about 3h later. After about an hour, I took a half-strength sleeping pill which didn’t quite work so well. I didn’t feel […]
4 August 2023
We landed in Singapore 20 mins late at 0920 for my nightstop. Immigration was a dream using the kiosks and baggage came soon after. To top it off, there were no queues for the taxi at Terminal 1. We got to the Hotel 81 Gold at 1030 while their official check-in time was 1500. The […]