Posted by Seth on December 14, 2011 under Mileage Run, Trip Reports | 
A visit to Hiroshima can be exhausting. Thank goodness for the island of Miyajima, just south of town, where a visit is rejuvenating and uplifting. It is a great counter to the emotional drain of the Peace Park in the center of town.
Miyajima is actually just a nickname for the island; it means "shrine island." The real name is Itsukushima and the island holds a long and storied history of religious significance. It was in 806 CE that a monk ascended the mountain on the island and established it as an ascetic site for the Shingon Buddhists. The island also has great significance in the Shinto religion as well, and the two have coexisted in an impressively symbiotic manner through the years. This is a great thing for visitors as the two present great sites to visit in a very condensed area.
Perhaps the most famous site on the island – and a UNESCO World Heritage Site – is the Itsukushima Shrine. Known mostly for its floating torii gate, the shrine complex is actually on stilts to help preserve the sanctity of the island. It doesn’t hurt that the stilts also keep the temples out of the water as the tides roll in, but the idea of keeping the commoners off the sacred soil is pretty nifty, too.
The temple itself includes a number of buildings, all lacquered in bright red, but the focus is the "floating" gate. It doesn’t really float; it is solidly planted in the ground just off-shore. But when the tide rolls in the base goes underwater and the visual is awesome. There are boats that offer tours of the gate, taking passengers out to see it up close. There is also a kayak rental shop on the island if you want to get up close on your own. Or, you can do what most tourists do and just take a photo from the shore, either inside the temple grounds or out. That’s what most the folks I saw were doing, including some incredibly cute kids dressed up in their finest.
The other main shrine complex on the island is the Daisho-In. For me this one was much more impressive. Maybe because it wasn’t packed wall-to-wall with tourists. Maybe because it seemed more dedicated to prayer. Or maybe just because I thought the architecture was more impressive. Likely a combination of all of the above. It was pretty awesome.
Just walk 5-10 minutes inland and uphill from the Itsukushima and you run right into the Daisho-In. The grounds are dotted with small prayer statues (hundreds of them and they all appear to be different) and there are a number of prayer wheels on the grounds. Some are on the stairs and others along the paths. All of them are said to bring great fortune to those who touch them as they visit.
There is also an impressive collection of prayer offerings at the shrine. The island is, for some reason, known for its wooden rice spatulas, and that is one of the main souvenirs that is on sale in the markets on the island. It is also apparently one of the more common prayer offering vehicles at the Daisho-In shrine. There were hundreds of them with prayers offered up on them. Some of the prayers were less traditional than others.
The town itself is supposedly maintained in "classical Edo-era" style but I didn’t see much evidence of that as I visited. It mostly seemed like a series of shops all selling basically the same trinkets or food options. And there were a ton of people crowding the area and trying to avoid having their snacks stolen by the local deer which are known for such shenanigans.
But snack options were yummy, including grilled oysters, a variety of street meats (including seafood) and some sort of potato thing wrapped in bacon and then grilled. Mostly delicious, all cheap and worth a try to provide nourishment as you’re wandering around the island. Oh, if you do go for a snack on the street buy your beer from the vending machines scattered about; way cheaper.
My trip was limited in time due to a pressing need to get back to the ferry to get back to the train to get back to the bus to get to the airport so I could take my flight on the 787. I missed the ropeway and the hike to the top of the island, known for great views of the surrounding area. I also missed seeing the island without the throngs of tourists, most of whom leave as afternoon turns into evening. Still, it was an awesome follow-up to the gravity of visiting the Peace Park; the two really do go hand in hand. Plus I got to ride the local train and a ferry as part of the deal, both of which were fun.
Read more from this Trip Report under the Dream2011 tag here.
Posted by Seth on December 13, 2011 under Mileage Run, Trip Reports |
August 6, 1945. In the blink of an eye the world had changed. Just a few hundred feet above Hiroshima, Japan, a bomb unlike any other ever used before detonated. The effects are still being felt today, nearly 70 years later. The tens of thousands who died immediately were, in many cases, the lucky ones, compared to those who suffered the after-effects in subsequent years. Today the city of Hiroshima has recovered rather impressively. But at its heart remains the shell of the one building left mostly standing when the bomb went off, a memorial to the dead and an eerie reminder of just how good we are at destroying ourselves.
That the building remains at all is something of a surprise. In part that is because it survived the explosion which was centered nearly directly above. But more because the Japanese were rather keen on razing the damaged structure shortly after the attack and clearing the space for reconstruction. Eventually the conservationists won out and the remains of the Prefectural Industrial Promotional Hall, now generally known as Genbaku, or A-bomb Dome, is now preserved as a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
There’s more to the area than just the dome. While it is the iconic center of the Peace Park area there are a number of other memorials within a 10 minute walk. Some are dedicated to specific groups (students and children are most common) and there is also the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum at the south end of the walk which holds some incredible artifacts from that fateful day and other exhibits as well.
Among those artifacts are watches which stopped at the moment of impact. Even if their owners had survived the watches would not be able to change from that point in time with the gears seized up from the explosion.
There was also a tricycle and helmet that were the prized toys of a small child killed in the aftermath of the explosion. His father buried them with his son in a grave near their home. Only years later was the body dug up and moved to a proper cemetery and the bike taken out to be preserved.
There are many more pictures and exhibits in the museum, nearly all of which are heart-wrenching. It is an experience that is not to be missed (the admission was a trivial ¥50, approximately USD $0.60) but is is also an experience that is both humbling and awesome.
Between the museum and the Dome the Peace Park are any more memorials and even more stories. One of the more famous is that of Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes. As a child suffering from leukemia as a result of the bombing Sadako heard the tale of folding one thousand paper cranes and having that grant a wish. The ending of the story varies as to whether the full 1,000 were folded by Sadako or not but she died not long after starting the effort. Her story is now shared in schools the world over with folded paper cranes arriving nearly daily at the memorial site (approximately 9 tons annually). The cranes have become something of a symbol for the city (ANA used them in their local announcement of 787 service) and for peace around the world.
On the day of my visit there were a few different school groups who came to the site to offer up their cranes to the memorial. Each group had a small performance associated with the offering (I have no idea what they were singing, of course) and then quickly made way for the next group such that all had the opportunity to participate.
There is also the Cenotaph dedicated to the victims of the bombing. Regardless of nationality, names are added to the registry held in the stone chest that sits under the arched roof. The chest holds more than 221,000 names and bears the inscription (translated from the Japanese), “Let all the souls here rest in peace, for we shall not repeat the evil.”
There is a Peace Bell in the park as well. Every now and then the sound of the bell rings out over the area; it is often the only sound you’ll hear walking through unless a school group is near by. The bell is marked with a map of the world that ignores national boundaries. The strike point of the mounted log is an icon of the atom such that each time the bell tolls a statement is made opposing atomic weapons.
A visit to the Peace Park can be emotionally draining, to be certain. It definitely was for me. But absolutely, completely and totally worth it. I’m incredibly happy that I chose Hiroshima as the interloping city for my 787 Dreamliner adventure and that I got to have the experience. It is unparalleled.
Read more from this Trip Report under the Dream2011 tag here.
Posted by Seth on December 11, 2011 under Hotel, Review, Trip Reports |
As part of my quick run to Japan for a flight on ANA‘s 787 Dreamliner I found myself in need of a hotel quite close to Haneda airport. Normally I’d stay in a small room or pod hotel when in Tokyo (I’ve done a plywood box, too!) but with the subway not running 24×7 there I was concerned about getting out to the airport in time for a 6:45am departure and not spending a fortune on a taxi. There is a hotel at the terminal but the rates there for the nights I needed were rather steep; instead I found myself at the JAL City hotel, just a few minutes from the terminal.
Not being at the airport offered a few benefits over and above the lower rate. The hotel is located just a couple blocks from a subway station with a solid collection of restaurants and shops lining the path between the two. That made it quite easy for me to get a beer on arrival between the train and the hotel as well as dinner the one night I needed it.
It also meant that getting to and from the hotel was incredibly easy. The hotel offers a free shuttle but service from the international terminal wasn’t running when I arrived and I didn’t really want to wait around the second night after I returned from Hiroshima so I took the train both times coming in. With the subway running every 10 minutes or so and the fare at ¥300 (~$3.50) or less it was easy and cheap to just hop on the train.
As for the room, it was pretty much exactly what I expected from a "single" in Tokyo: SMALL. Enough room for me to dump my bag and sleep and even get into the bathroom but not much additional space for hanging out or relaxing. When I wanted to sit at the desk I found that the bed was quite close. Still, it was pretty much exactly what I needed for the nights I was there and only ~$120/night which was pretty good given the convenience of the location (the on-airport hotel was ~$250/night).
The other particularly interesting part of this hotel stay was that I needed to have some laundry done. I was on the road for 10 days with only a small backpack so the laundry day wasn’t really a surprise. In fact it was a planned part of the itinerary. And I think my clothes may have had a better time at the hotel than I did. They were certainly more pampered. The five shirts and pair of jeans I had cleaned came back individually wrapped in plastic. Then wrapped in a bow. Then stacked and wrapped again. Oh, and the shirts had wax paper or something like that folded inside to keep them wrinkle free. And it definitely worked. The clothes traveled quite well for the second half of the trip despite being jammed in the same backpack as the first half.
Overall I have no regrets about the stay. And if I find myself in a similar situation – late arrival or early departure from HND – I wouldn’t hesitate to stay there again. Lacking that time sensitivity I’d head into town, but that’s not always an option.
Read more from this Trip Report under the Dream2011 tag here.
Posted by Seth on November 21, 2011 under Hotel, Review, Trip Reports |
The range of hotel options available in Beijing is tremendously broad. From dirt cheap rooms with no windows to grand luxury with a few more zeroes on the nightly rate, anything can be had. As I researched options for my stay I was reasonably certain of the neighborhood I wanted to be in – near Tiananmen Square and Wangfujing – and I knew that, as usual, I wasn’t going to be shelling out the big bucks for the luxury experience. I was also, however, a bit suspect of the cheapest properties. When their biggest selling point in the customer reviews is that the front desk does a pretty good job of keeping the hookers out at night so they cannot solicit you in your room that’s not necessarily the level of accommodation I’m looking for.
I ended up at the Starway Premier TianAn Rega hotel. The rate was pretty reasonable (~$75/night, all in) and the location was perfect. It was a block north of the main drag and directly between the Tiananmen East and Wangfujing stations on the Beijing Metro. And there was no indication that there was even a risk of having prostitutes roaming the halls looking for business.
Arrival was smooth and the folks at the front desk spoke enough English that I was able to get the small bits of information I needed from them without issue. They claimed that I was upgraded into a better room, though I’m not so sure what that meant as it looked a lot like what I booked, but sure. And the room was pretty nice.
Free wired internet in the room and free bottled water, too. The mini-bar had a few options, though I never felt compelled to give that a go; there were bodegas downstairs with cheap beer if desired.
The only notable complaint about the room was the noise from the street that filtered up. Despite two sets of windows in between inside and out I was definitely hearing the cars and trucks rolling by at night. And since the hotel faces a relatively large street there was plenty of traffic. Not a huge deal as I travel with ear plugs but it was a bit annoying. I’m also not sure what the net effect of that would be on insulating the room at either the hot or cold seasonal extremes.
Oh, and only a stand-up shower with a translucent divider between the shower and the bedroom. Perhaps a bit awkward if sharing and not particularly close to your roommate but, again, not the end of the world.
At the price point the room was definitely a good deal, especially for the location. I’d have no hesitations about booking again. It is also right across the street from a Days Inn which is a bit more recessed from the road and might lose some of the noise issues, though I wasn’t in one of those rooms so I cannot say for certain.
Read more from this Trip Report under the Dream2011 tag here.
Posted by Seth on November 16, 2011 under Dining, Review, Trip Reports |
There’s something to be said for enjoying the local dining delicacies when traveling. Whether Peking Duck is actually a local dish in Beijing or not is certainly the subject of some debate – there are a number of folks who suggest it is better in other cities – but given that I was in Beijing and it was available, I figured I’d give it a try. There are a few restaurants generally considered as the upper echelon of options for the experience and I chose Made In China, one of the restaurants at the Grand Hyatt Beijing.
It should be noted that ordering the Peking Duck is very much an experience, not just a meal. And as executed at Made In China it was a rather wonderful one. Not just for the quality of the food, which is incredibly high, but also for the expansive presentation and the expertise and precision with which the entire exercise is carried out.
 |
| The speed and precision with which the waiter carved and presented the duck was incredible. |
My favorite part of most poultry is the skin. And that also happens to be the part that is most special when it comes to cooking the duck. The skin holds much of the fat from the bird, meaning that it can be chewy or otherwise not so great. But when prepared correctly the skin is crispy and full of flavor, without too much fat dripping off. The staff insisted that it be sprinkled with a bit of sugar to complete the effect. I’m not completely convinced that was needed. It was simply delicious.
 |
| Duck skin, sprinkled with a bit of sugar. |
Next up after the skin was the breast meat, served with hoisin sauce, leeks, cucumbers and small pancakes for making small rolls. Not surprisingly, there was nearly as much focus on the presentation of the meats as there was on the quality of the preparation.
This was followed by the leg meat being carved and presented. The leg was actually my favorite bit, much like it is on other poultry. As served up at Made In China the leg meat was a full ross-section of flavors, including the skin and a layer of fat, in addition to the meat itself. Each bite was a combination of the flavors.
In the end, the amount of food presented for the order is somewhat staggering.
 |
| One of these days I’ll learn to order a meal that doesn’t require a spare stomach. That will be quite sad. |
From a logistics perspective, making a reservation is highly recommended, both for a table and for a duck. Preparing the duck can take over an hour if you don’t and that’s not much fun. That said, if you do have an hour to spare while waiting you have the opportunity to sample some of the other food on the menu. Thinking that I was going to be waiting that hour I actually ordered an appetizer, scallion pancakes, to nosh on while waiting for the duck to show up. The duck actually was served first. Whoopsie. Not that I’m particularly disappointed as that was also delicious, but it was way too much food for just me.
For seating, as a single guest they managed to find room for me at one of the bars scattered through the restaurant. I much prefer that arrangement to being seated at a table on my own so that was great. Plus, rather than a cocktail bar this one was located facing into the dumpling kitchen. So in addition to the great food I was treated to the entertainment of watching the chefs work their magic on a variety of different doughy delights.
Overall the entire experience was wonderful. Yes, it is one of the more expensive meals in Beijing, but it isn’t actually all that pricey. I walked out for under USD $50, including one cocktail and fully stuffed with delicious food. Well worth it for the experience; I highly recommend it.
Read more from this Trip Report under the Dream2011 tag here.
Posted by Seth on November 9, 2011 under Flying, Trip Reports |
When booking my flight from Tokyo‘s Haneda airport to Hiroshima to position for my 787 Dreamliner trip I really wanted to book the 7:50am departure. It is a quite civilized time to fly and wouldn’t require waking up at a ridiculous hour to get to the airport. Alas, the inventory I needed for my Japan Pass wasn’t available so I booked the 6:50am flight. The early flight is early, but that was the only viable option for getting to Hiroshima with enough time to see the city and also get the 787 flight. So that’s what I booked.
Haneda is a great airport and I got there quite quickly from the JAL City Haneda hotel (more on that later, I hope) and was hanging out in the lounge prior to flight. The lounge was nice enough, though no food so I ambled back out into the terminal to see about grabbing some breakfast prior to the flight. That’s when I noticed one of the agents behind the counter writing on a large white board. The flight was oversold. Given that I was at the airport an hour earlier than I wanted to be anyways I was happy to volunteer.
The process of volunteering was not as simple as it is in the USA, mostly because I do not speak the language. With some gestures and pointing at the board and my boarding pass I managed to get the point across and the agents asked me to wait to see what would happen. It turns out that they did need me as a volunteer. Woohoo!
There were a number of interesting things about the process. For one, the compensation offer was either cash or points in ANA‘s Mileage Club loyalty program. The offer was JPY 10,000 (~$130) or 7,500 points which is a pretty high valuation for the points. Lacking any use for the points I chose the cash.
After making that choice I realized that there were still a lot of ways this could go wrong. If they needed to mail me a voucher or if they issued a check I was going to have trouble actually collecting on the offer. Much to my surprise, however, that turned out to not be an issue. The comp was paid out at the gate. In cash!
The entire process was incredibly civilized and polite; no real surprise there given that I was in Japan where that sort of thing is taken quite seriously. In the end the JPY 10,000 was about the amount I had paid for the one-way segment and I got the comp in cash which meant it actually had decent value to me. Of course, I didn’t convert it back to dollars so I’ll have to spend it to actually see the value, but that’s just another excuse to head back to Japan, something I don’t need much encouragement for anyways.
Read more from this Trip Report under the Dream2011 tag here.
Related Posts:
Tags: 787, ANA, Dream2011, Dreamliner, Flying, frequent flyer, Hiroshima, Japan, points, Tokyo, Trip Report
Posted by Seth on November 9, 2011 under Flying, Internet, Trip Reports |
I have never really felt that the value proposition of the gogo service was particularly great. The cost of the service is generally high and the service quality has not been spectacular. Still, on my flight home this past Monday I had some work to get done and doing it on the plane would save me a few hours. Plus it was billable time so I could easily justify the cost of the service for the sake of getting the billable revenue. So I gave it a try.
Shortly after departure from LAX I opened up my laptop and signed on. I paid the fee and tried to connect to the services I needed to get the work done. Performance was, sadly, poor. Web pages were timing out and the non-web services I needed to use were barely functional. I loaded up speedtest.net and gave it a go. The numbers weren’t pretty:
Ouch.
I tweeted the results and the gogo twitter account got back to me right away, suggesting that I wait a few minutes and try again. Or I could contact their chat support online. A few minutes later the numbers were no better:
Time to contact support.
I explained my situation and went back and forth on the details with the chat folks. Ultimately, this was the conclusion we came to:
You’re on a busy route; it’s possible there is a large number of users on your flight, which can affect speeds. Unfortunately, we’re not able to ‘fix’ bandwidth issues, as the factors that can cause them – including location relative to our towers and the number of users on your flight – are all outside our control.
Not so helpful, actually.
They offered me a freebie for the next time I need to use the service, which I guess is OK, but given that it barely works on the flights where I’d actually want to use it I’m not so sure what the value is there.
I’m not so surprised by this problem; last time I tried to use it I had similar performance issues. Then I blamed it on the fact that more folks were using it because it was free that day. Apparently that’s not the issue at all. Oh, and it wasn’t just me. Runway Girl was having similar troubles on her westbound flight; we tweeted about it a bit.
In the end the service just doesn’t work for me, at least not well enough that I’m willing to pay for it. So I’ll be saving my money and reading or writing on the planes instead. Probably better for me overall anyways.
Related Posts:
Posted by Seth on November 7, 2011 under Trip Reports |
Let’s say you’re a Chinese emperor, ruling the kingdom at some point between 1420 and 1911 and it is time to offer sacrifices and pray for a good harvest. Where do you go? I’ve got just the place: The Temple of Heaven, located just a bit south of the Imperial Palaces at the Forbidden City in Beijing.
The complex is huge – reportedly the largest complex in the world devoted to rituals paying homage to heaven – and it includes a number of buildings which were used to both prepare for and to offer up sacrifices for a plentiful harvest. The most well known of these buildings is the circular tower of the Hall of Prayer for a Good Harvest.
The hall was used for making the appropriate official sacrifices on the altar housed inside.
Of particular interest at this site, especially after seeing all the thrones and other bits devoted to making the emperor’s position most exalted, was that the Temple of Heaven includes a few features that actually knock him back down to earth. There is a processional area that the emperor would walk on to approach the temple to conduct the prayer ceremony. It is slightly inclined so that the approach to the temple actually reflects the idea of ascending to heaven.
Upon arrival at the temple site the procession would pass through the gates to enter the courtyard where the temple sits. The gate is raised on a marble platform, showing it to be one of the more significant gates in the culture, and it has three doors. While the approach path had a center lane explicitly reserved for the emperor to walk on the center of the three doors in the gate was considered too great even for the emperor; it was reserved only for the holy spirits to enter the grounds.
The temple grounds today are much more than just a relic of the past. They are well maintained as a park area and on the day of my visit they were packed with folks out enjoying the facility. There was a Chinese version of hackey sack being played (the sack has feathers on it which notably alters the flight behavior) all over the park. A few gentlemen invited me to briefly join them in their game. I was, somewhat expectedly, rather bad at it. I blame the feathers but I know that’s just an excuse.
There were others around dancing, exercising, making music or playing games. It was quite the gathering place for the locals.
Overall, a very enjoyable experience, both for the historical landmark and also the cultural experience of seeing the locals at play. Good times.
Read more from this Trip Report under the Dream2011 tag here.
Posted by Seth on November 7, 2011 under Hotel, Internet, Trip Reports |
Yesterday morning I found myself in need of a hotel in or near Burbank, California. No big deal, right? I did my typical search across a few different sites (ended up booking via hotels.com because I was redeeming my Welcome Rewards points) and found a room at the Ramada by the airport that was the right price and got decent enough reviews (though mine won’t be so glowing, I expect). Once I had that as a basis for my price comparisons I did what I normally do next – check the page of the hotel operator to see if they’ve got a better deal or a best rate guarantee I can take advantage of. And that’s where they lost me.
Perhaps more appropriately I should say that Ramada lost Burbank. Typing Burbank, California into their search engine returned the following map results:
Apparently we’re moving Burbank 300 miles northwest this weekend. Go figure.
Not the first random hotel booking site that I’ve found cannot get geography and I got around it (searched for Los Angeles and scrolled up the map to Burbank) but pretty impressive that they can fail so badly.
Related Posts
Posted by Seth on November 3, 2011 under Flying, Review, Trip Reports |
It was day three of scheduled commercial service for the Boeing 787 Dreamliner, operated by ANA, and I was on board. No, it was not the actual inaugural flight, but I still managed to get there within the first week of operations and I could not be more excited about the experience. It was awesome. That’s not to say that everything about the aircraft is perfect, but the experience certainly was.
My flight on the Dreamliner was from Hiroshima to Tokyo‘s Haneda airport. The trip is only about 400 miles and the total time in the air was just over one hour so it wasn’t really sufficient to try out everything on board, especially the effects of the higher pressurization (though I don’t recall my ears popping like usual, but I’m also not great at noticing that because it happens so often) and the more moist cabin air, but I still managed to put it through the paces as best I could.
Boarding was quick and efficient, as expected from the Japanese. Still, they allotted an extra 5 minutes to the process as they knew this was a special experience. There was something of a crush of gate lice to the self-boarding gates as they announced that boarding was available. Fortunately my Star Alliance Gold status (and being the big, ugly American) got me towards the front of the crush and on reasonably early in the process.
Business Class Cabin
Nothing really to say here; looks pretty comfy but this also is not their premium long-haul configuration so I’m not too worried about it.
Economy Cabin
There has been a bit of concern since Seat Guru published their guide to the seat map of the aircraft about the seat width in coach. The 2-4-2 layout (which really is more like 2-2-2-2 without an aisle in the middle) lends itself to a very generous seat width yet the reports on the site show the width as a hip-crushing 16.5". Good news, folks. That data is just plain wrong. The bulkhead rows, where the tray tables are in the arm rest, have the narrower width but the rest of the aircraft has a quite generous 18.5" or more width. The seats are quite roomy.
Seat recline is an interesting change from a typical airplane configuration. The seat back doesn’t actually move. Instead the seat-bottom slides forward about three inches and the back slides down a bit, creating the same effect as reclining. But it does so without imposing the seat on the passenger behind you. This sucks if you have long legs and also want to recline as you’re basically stuck but it is great for folks (like me) who hate having someone reclined into you.
The AVOD system is pretty nice, with 9" screens in coach. That’s about as big as you can get being so close to the screen and still be able to watch comfortably. There is a seat-to-seat messaging system and the screens can be used either as touch screens or with the controller. I was rather unimpressed with the music and video selections; no movies (though maybe because the flight was too short) and only a couple dozen short video programs plus maybe a dozen CDs for music. I hope that’s just because they don’t have the content fully loaded and not because it is going to be such a paltry offering going forward.
I’m also a big fan of the built-in cup holder in the tray table. They have two, one if it is open and one if it is closed, meaning that you can use the tray table for a laptop or other purposes and still have somewhere to stow a drink. Definitely a nice touch.
And then there is the mood lighting. Lots of fun there. The flight attendants were playing with this feature a bit, particularly during boarding and de-planing. It is fun, but I’m not sure it adds much value to the in-flight experience. It does demonstrate the ability to control the lighting levels to a very granular level, which I suppose is a very useful thing.
The windows are HUGE. It was a night flight so I’m not sure how much this really matters, but they were noticeably larger than on older aircraft. We’ll have to see what the net effects of this are in the long term but it certainly was nice. The electronic dimmers on the windows were a bit sluggish to react but they behaved exactly as advertised in the end. Again, a night flight made it hard to really evaluate the impact of this but it was certainly neat.
In the lav
The Japanese and their toilets. Touchless flushing (it puts down the seat, too!) and bidet functions (designed by Toto) are built in to the toilets. There’s also a window in the lav by 3L (though not at 3R). I do like a lav window.
It isn’t perfect
OK, maybe my expectations are just too high. Still, like one of the notes in a review offered up by Kerwin I noticed a few quirks in the flight. It was VERY quiet at cruise, and I was sitting just aft of the wing so I should’ve had engine noise to some extent if there was much. During the flight there wasn’t. That said, the mechanical noises surrounding the operation of the flaps and other wing control surfaces were pretty loud. Again, maybe just because I was sitting basically on top of them, but Kerwin noticed it, too.
There was also a strange "whine" going on throughout the flight. It was very high pitched – like an old tube TV going bad – and I have no idea if others noticed it or not. It kept going even after the engines were shut down upon arrival so I’m guessing it has to do with the electrical power plant on board. No matter what, it was pretty annoying. Not enough to ruin the experience, but if it really is like that going forward I can see it being a problem for me flying on this aircraft.
Finally, the new overhead bins, while well designed for baggage, are not particularly well configured for an adult to climb in. I’m thoroughly disappointed in that development.
It was a great day and a great trip. I’m definitely looking forward to getting back on board soon.
Oh, and if you want to check out the pre-flight safety video it is here:
Read more from this Trip Report under the Dream2011 tag here.
Tags: 787, ANA, Boeing, Dream2011, Dreamliner, Hiroshima, Japan, Photos, review, Star Alliance, Tokyo, video
Posted by Seth on November 3, 2011 under Flying, Trip Reports |
I landed at Tokyo‘s Haneda airport about two hours ago having just flown in on the Boeing 787 Dreamliner from Hiroshima. The experience was quite spectacular, though not everything about the aircraft was perfect.
That said, it is very late and I’ve been up for near 20 hours now today and the adrenaline is finally wearing off so putting together a full post with coherent thoughts simply isn’t going to happen. Instead I’ve decided to post this teaser with just a few of the many, many photos I shot throughout the day.
A full post will be coming after I’ve slept a few hours, so either late tonight back in the USA or tomorrow; either way it’ll be tomorrow here in Japan. Enjoy the pictures.
Read more from this Trip Report under the Dream2011 tag here.
