{"id":1597,"date":"2014-06-30T08:24:03","date_gmt":"2014-06-30T01:24:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/gordonandjudy.com\/?p=1597"},"modified":"2014-06-30T08:30:28","modified_gmt":"2014-06-30T01:30:28","slug":"tokyo-and-hotel-comparisons-62514","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/gordonandjudy.com\/?p=1597","title":{"rendered":"Tokyo and hotel comparisons, 6\/25\/14"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Beijing Airport is looking way too familiar.\u00a0 <\/span>No problems checking in and we arrive at our gate after security and customs with an hour to kill.\u00a0 <\/span>The flight leaves on time, and arrives a little early at Tokyo Narita Airport.\u00a0 <\/span>It\u2019s a long ways into town, and I decided to try the Narita Express Train, the fastest route to downtown.\u00a0 <\/span>It takes almost an hour, with only one quick stop at another terminal.<\/p>\n

\"IMG_0651\"<\/a>

The Tokyo Sky Tree. This photo was taken from the Narita Express train headed into town.<\/p><\/div>\n

Now we get to find our way out of the station.\u00a0 <\/span>Tokyo is the largest city in the world, so it might be expected that the train station is HUGE!\u00a0 <\/span>We arrive on the 5th<\/sup> basement floor.\u00a0 <\/span>There are many escalators to maneuver through, with all our luggage.\u00a0 <\/span>I\u2019ve deduced our exit gate, but it\u2019s a serious hike to finally get there.\u00a0 <\/span>It took us time to figure out the signs.\u00a0 <\/span>Now that we\u2019re out of the station, where\u2019s our hotel?\u00a0 <\/span>The website instructions were vague, and the street signs are not in English.\u00a0 <\/span>One would think the Marriott Courtyard Tokyo Station<\/span> would be close?\u00a0 <\/span>We finally stumble across a sign for the hotel, and walk into an office building?\u00a0 <\/span>Over in one corner is a small elevator with the \u201cCourtyard\u201d symbol.\u00a0 <\/span>The lobby desk is on the 4th<\/sup> floor, and after checking in, we move back to our rooms on the 3rd<\/sup> floor.<\/p>\n

\"IMG_2978\"<\/a> \"IMG_0662\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Courtney\u2019s room in the Beijing Courtyard was really big and nice, with lots of amenities.\u00a0 <\/span>Our rooms in the Xi\u2019an Sheraton were huge, and new.\u00a0 <\/span>We are now in the smallest rooms I\u2019ve ever seen.\u00a0 <\/span>Cruise ship rooms are bigger.\u00a0 <\/span>I guess this is a rehearsal for our cruise in July.\u00a0 <\/span>We started reading some of the online reviews on the hotel, and apparently, these are \u201cpar for the course\u201d in Tokyo.\u00a0 <\/span>Man, these are little, and expensive<\/span>.\u00a0 <\/span>Oh well, \u201cwhen in Rome.\u201d\u00a0 <\/span>When you check out the room pix below, notice the electronic command center by the toilet seat.\u00a0 <\/span>It\u2019s pretty complicated and delivers all kinds of \u201cservices\u201d.\u00a0 <\/span>This was not uncommon in many of the washrooms in Japan, and some included even more \u201cactivities\u201d.<\/p>\n

\"IMG_0661\"<\/a>

Tokyo Courtyard Marriott. It’s kinda tight!<\/p><\/div>\n

\"IMG_0656\"<\/a>

Check out the “control panel” beside the toilet seat<\/p><\/div>\n

\"IMG_1263\"<\/a>

This was actually one of the simple “toilet control panels” we experienced in Japan.<\/p><\/div>\n

\"IMG_0660\"<\/a> \"IMG_0657\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"IMG_0633\"<\/a>

Courtyard Beijing, Courtney’s room<\/p><\/div>\n

\"IMG_0768\"<\/a>

Xi’an Sheraton<\/p><\/div>\n

\"IMG_0775\"<\/a> \"IMG_0774\"<\/a> \"IMG_0769\"<\/a><\/p>\n

After unpacking, Courtney is ready to head out to Tokyo Disney.\u00a0 <\/span>Judy and I walk her over to the train station where she\u2019ll commute to the park.\u00a0 <\/span>When she leaves, we wander around trying to get our bearings, before heading back to the hotel, and finding dinner.\u00a0 <\/span>Courtney checks in later with us, and she\u2019s having a blast.\u00a0 <\/span>When she gets back to the hotel at 10:40, she wakes us to let us know she\u2019s safely back.\u00a0 <\/span>It took me quite a while to come out of my stupor to figure out what was going on.\u00a0 <\/span>It took me no time to get back to sleep.<\/p>\n

\"IMG_0667\"<\/a>

The Tokyo version!<\/p><\/div>\n

\"IMG_0666\"<\/a> \"IMG_0687\"<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Beijing Airport is looking way too familiar.\u00a0 No problems checking in and we arrive at our gate after security and customs with an hour to kill.\u00a0 The flight leaves on time, and arrives a little early at Tokyo Narita … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/gordonandjudy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1597"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/gordonandjudy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/gordonandjudy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/gordonandjudy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/gordonandjudy.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1597"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/gordonandjudy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1597\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1601,"href":"http:\/\/gordonandjudy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1597\/revisions\/1601"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/gordonandjudy.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1597"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/gordonandjudy.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1597"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/gordonandjudy.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1597"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}