With super cheap tickets, there's almost no incentive for 2+ week trips for me any longer. With that said, and with my girlfriend being able to take time off, we headed for a trip to Asia. Initially we were looking to travel to three places: South Korea, Hong Kong, and Japan to top it off in about 7-8 days. I even had some plans to extend my trip by a few days to explore some regions of Tohoku that I didn't get a chance to explore back in 2019. However, with the possibility of a strike, and thinking how tiring it might be to travel to 3 countries in that short of a time, we narrowed it down to a 7 day trip between Japan and Korea. To be more specific, Tokyo and Seoul.
Fortunately, I was able to drop off the dogs at my parents a couple of days before we flew. That helped in feeling less rushed on the day of the flight, in comparison to November 2025. I did my ritual cleaning before we headed to my parent's house. Like last time, we were fortunate to get a ride to the airport. The car ride was relatively smooth and it was relatively easy to find a spot near the doors leading to the departure section of the airport. After collecting our bags and saying goodbye to my dad, we headed in to check in our luggage.
Once our luggage were dropped off, we headed to go through security before heading to the WestJet Elevation lounge since she had a few more passes to use before they expired. We had to wait a bit since they were full, but after about 15 minutes we were able to enter. Luckily, there was a small table near the entrance. We headed to secure our spot, before placing an order of food. Once we finished eating, we rested a while before we headed down to the international terminal to wait for our ride. Fortunately, we were able to get an upgrade to premium economy. Better yet, and maybe a bit of a controversial take, we got bulkhead seats off to the right side of the plane. With so little people in premium flying, there were a load of overhead storage space for our single carry on bag. With our welcome mimosas in hand, we relaxed while waiting for the rest of the people to board. If I recall correctly, there were at least 60-70 seats available, meaning that check in went by quickly. Unlike the thunderstorm last year, weather in Calgary was perfect meaning we were able to take off on time.
Throughout the flight, I entertained myself with playing games on my Switch 2. After I got bored, I stopped to watch Project Hail Mary, which was a really good watch (maybe something I can incorporate into my class as a movie to watch before break). I think I was able to get an hour or two of sleep before it was almost time to land. Breakfast was some dumplings, which actually tasted extremely good!
Once we landed, it was smooth sailing through immigrations. It didn't take too long either for our luggage to come out. After going through customs, we headed to purchase tickets for the Keisei Skyliner. It took about 40 minutes to get to Ueno, in which we stopped to grab some Ichiran. There was a bit of lineup, and thus making it sweltering hot waiting in line wearing sweats. Luckily, people were going in and out quickly so we probably only had to wait 10-15 minutes. Feeling a bit bloated from all the food I ate, which is more than I normally eat before and during flying, I opted for just a plain ramen with one egg.
After finishing our meal, we headed down to the subway to catch the train to Asakusa. We were staying at a different APA hotel than last time, but it was closer to the shopping arcade. After checking in, dropping our luggage, and changing into shorts (taking off my compression socks as well which were starting to irritate my skin... probably from all the walking in them), we headed back out to shop at Muji inside the Rox department store. Our main purpose for this short trip, was to literally just shop and eat. Instead of lugging a plastic bag/paper bag of Muji goods, my girlfriend purchased a Hulken bag on a previous trip so that I can roll our shopping around. Since the night was relatively still young, we headed to a nearby Taito arcade to play some crane games. We both won small toys (my second one in my entire life if memory serves me correctly), before we called it a night. Wanting some ice cream, we headed to the nearby 7-11. I can no longer find the mint chocolate ice cream that I always get, but there was another mint chocolate ice cream that turned out to be pretty close to what I normally get in terms of taste!
With that said, our first night in Tokyo is over. Just two more full days before heading off to South Korea!
True that you don't have underseat storage, but I think it's a good compromise to have an adjustable footrest attached to your chair! I found out about this feature last year when I was fortunate enough to come back to Canada with a bulkhead seat.
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