I arrived (eventually) at my hotel in Sapporo around about 5 p.m. Japan time (JT) which is 8 a.m. UK time of the same day as Japan is ahead by 9 hours. Its been a long 'day' as I had left home to head for the airport at about 6 a.m. Sunday. So that makes 26 hours plus the 9 as a result of the time zone changes, although they aren't extra lived hours they still have an effect on the body. Also I didn't sleep that much on the flights so it's not surprising that I am tired! I am sticking in a phew pictures taken through the various plane windows - some are coming into Amsterdam, some Tokyo and the final one is coming into New Chitose on Hokkaido.
So achievement 1 (someone can be in charge of keeping a tally!) is to have got here with luggage intact, but it was not without issues. Now thinking back I am not sure if I misunderstood a sign at Birmingham about lithium batteries but I had put my spares in the 'hold' luggage, which proved to be a mistake. Luggage was weighed (with my fingers crossed behind my back), but allowed even though it was marginally over the 23kg allowance. All went fine went well until I got to the check-in desk in Tokyo ready for the Vanilla Airways flight to Sapporo. I had made use of the technology and checked in at home beforehand so only needed to do a luggag drop. Vanilla are a bit like Ryan air - and I had paid 2000yen extra to buy 5kgs additional weight as their limit was only 20kgs. The asssistant took my case and asked abotu contents....are there any laptops etc in the hold luggage.....I mentioned the batteries as I had read the notice in diagram format, while I stood in the queue. All passengers have to wait for their bags to go through the machine before they are allowed to go to the gate, with a mention that you should listen for your name and if you hear nothing after 10 minutes all is well. So I had just found a seat when the tannoi announces that I should return to the security area. I was shown a diagram indicating a problem and my permission was requested for the assistant to open my bag.
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| Pity it is so small..those white lumps looked like salt piles |
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| Lovely straight bands of different crops! |
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| Lakes and greenery but it looks very flat. |
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| Not sure where this one was, but its green! |
Glad that it happened on the way out as luckily all the contents were clean and reasonably orderly. After 2 goes through the luggage and repeats of the x-rays all batteries were found but there was still a problem. Scan 3 indicated the problem was in my soap bag so the chappie gets it out again (3rd time!) and moved each container and eventually a tiny zapper that I use to relieve bug bites showed its face. I explained in my best 'Japanese sign language' what it was for and the offending dark green gadget was put into the xray machine all on its own. Yippee thought I as the operative came over and said - that's ok! That little 'thing' has been in the soap bag for ages but I cursed it fully as was beginning to think that they weren't going to let me get on the plane! Lets just say I have learned tha I must check in future - no lectures please!!
Having trouble with the photo loading so will stop for tonight. ttfn all. NB now added some pictures but the positioning is all wrong...more study required later!
So achievement 1 (someone can be in charge of keeping a tally!) is to have got here with luggage intact, but it was not without issues. Now thinking back I am not sure if I misunderstood a sign at Birmingham about lithium batteries but I had put my spares in the 'hold' luggage, which proved to be a mistake. Luggage was weighed (with my fingers crossed behind my back), but allowed even though it was marginally over the 23kg allowance. All went fine went well until I got to the check-in desk in Tokyo ready for the Vanilla Airways flight to Sapporo. I had made use of the technology and checked in at home beforehand so only needed to do a luggag drop. Vanilla are a bit like Ryan air - and I had paid 2000yen extra to buy 5kgs additional weight as their limit was only 20kgs. The asssistant took my case and asked abotu contents....are there any laptops etc in the hold luggage.....I mentioned the batteries as I had read the notice in diagram format, while I stood in the queue. All passengers have to wait for their bags to go through the machine before they are allowed to go to the gate, with a mention that you should listen for your name and if you hear nothing after 10 minutes all is well. So I had just found a seat when the tannoi announces that I should return to the security area. I was shown a diagram indicating a problem and my permission was requested for the assistant to open my bag.
