April 1 - Getting Aboard

 We checked out of the hotel room last night to beat the crowds.  The hotel itself was quite nice with comfortable rooms and a decent location.  We loved the bidet with its warm water (ours at home is cold water), but the elevator situation was crazy.  It could take 10 minutes to get downstairs when it was busy.

Our morning tour today was rather underwhelming.  Our guide, Yuki, was nice and her English was very good.  The problem was that, as with both of the other days, we spent more time on the bus than at the sites.  They packed 3 stops in, the first being the Meiji Shrine.  The buses have to park a ways away and then you walk a good ways for basically a photo stop.  We didn't get to see anything inside, so we wandered around for 20 minutes or so and then wandered back to the bus.  It then took us 15 minutes to get back into traffic and away from the Shrine.

The fiew from our hotel room on the 26th floor

The gates to the shrine

The shrine.  It was crowded today.

Today is the start of the new fiscal year here and we saw many new university graduates around in their black suits and ties.  They have a ceremony at their business to celebrate their employment.  It's also the first day of school.

The next stop was the Shogun Gardens and again we had to park a long way away.  Fortunately, the predicted rain never appeared and the weather was actually pleasant - no need for a coat.

Part of the Tokyo Skyline

Our last stop was at the Imperial Palace.  Again, no getting near the palace, only glimpses through the trees.  We parked and walked for 10 minutes up to the gates and took a few photos.  I think people were getting a little antsy to get going to the ship.  It was around 1:00 pm by this time, and we had already heard from Steve and Leona Holaday that they were on board having lunch.  We met Steve and Leona on the World Cruise also and they, along with Jan and Tom, made up our trivia team on that cruise.  We 6 have kept up by Zoom every few weeks, as schedules allow, since then, but this is the first time we've actually seen them since March 2020.

My photos are out of order.  This is the entrance to the Imperial Palace grounds with the guards.

This is the Shogun Gardens

A 300+ year old red Pine

It was finally time to head to the ship.  We got there around 1:30 and had no trouble checking in and getting on board right away.  We went straight to the suite and started putting away our carry-on stuff.  Our luggage hadn't arrived, so we went out to wander the ship.  I took some photos of our Penthouse Category Cabin before we spread all of our stuff around.  It's actually 2 rooms and you can close off the bedroom side with 2 sliding doors.  This is by far the largest cabin we've ever had.  We may be spoiled going forward!

You enter into the dining area and the sitting area beyond.

Bedroom, walk-in closet and large bathroom

Double sinks are nice

Very large shower with 2 overhead heads and 8 side heads.

Our butler, Naveen, from India

A very large deck, although it may be a bit cold on this trip to use much.

Plenty of storage in the walk-in closet

Our luggage arrived in short order and we unpacked and relaxed until we met the gang for pre-dinner cocktails in the Observation Loungs.  We had quite the group - 11 of us altogether.  Us, Jan/Tom, Steve/Leona, Phil/Carol, Sue/Jerry, and the last person we knew was onboard, Sarah Haverstick, came by and joined us.  We met Sarah on the Grand Arcitc (also through trivia).  Sarah lives in Cambria, CA.  We had a drink or 2 and then all headed down to Compass Rose for dinner.  Amazingly, they were able to put as at 2 tables in the back next to each other.  It was a lovely dinner, but we were all beat and headed back to our respective suites around 8:30.  This jet lag is really proving hard to beat.  We're 13 hours ahead of home and it's a huge adjustment.  I remember hearing that it takes one day for each hour of difference - sure hope that isn't right!