Day 1 Yokahama

The ANA flight from LA arrived in Yokahama 1 ½ hour early, about 4:20 am. We had to wait till the bus ticket office opened at 5 am. The bus ride from the airport (Haneda) to Yokahama City Terminal (YCAT) was very interesting. All industrial with sprinkling of apartments and very few houses. The city terminal was very efficient. We checked our bags in lockers and set out to explore. Unfortunately, at 6 am everything was closed. The stores would not open till 10:30. We found a café in the underground mall/train station, had some coffee and breakfast and figured out where we could go. We walked to the nearby Minato Mirai 21 district, which is located in redeveloped docks and is full of stunning ultra-modern architecture. Supposedly it is a favorite weekend place with lots of entertainment and street performers, but definitely not at 6 am. We saw the huge building of the Yokohama Museum of Art and the tallest building in the city, the Yokohama Tower, but like everything else, they didn’t open until 10:30. We walked till we were exhausted trying to kill 4 hours. We got back to the terminal where there are several underground malls with hundreds of stores. Bo explored and even bought a t-shirt at Zara. Around noon, we took a cab to the port and checked in to our room. The ship is huge, but the check-in was very quick and efficient. The 2 bottles of wine survived the trip and we immediately had wine on our balcony. We explored the ship from top to bottom (16 levels) . We were so tired that we barely made it to dinner at 7:45. Our 3 table mates include a Japanese-American artist from Palm Springs and a couple of avid golfers from New Zealand. We skipped all the shows and festivities after dinner and went straight to sleep.

Preamble

This is our 47th trip together. We fly to Yokahama Japan, spend half a day there and then board our cruise ship. The cruise is 18 days and we visit 11 cities in Japan, one in Korea, and one in Russia.