Updated Narita From London

Flew to Narita on a British Airways Flight from London Heathrow which took 11 hrs and 25 minutes. In my experience of flying to Japan, the Air Traffic Control System is well organised so that it avoids being held in a holding pattern and takes you straight to the gate. Once off the jetty, the walk to the Immigation area was relatively short i.e. around 3 minutes if you walk my pace which is fairly slow to medium. Also, as you walk along to the immigration hall, you will hear announcements on the tannoy saying that if you have a fever or diarrhoea which I find funny you will need to inform the port authority which has a stand before you start queueing for immigration. On this occasion the camera which they use to measure ones temperature was not activated.

Whilst queueing for your turn to be seen by the officer, there are markers along the queueing positions informing you of the average waiting time from the point where you are standing. As far as I can remember, the maximum wait was around 30 minutes (depending on the number of flights arriving at the time of your touchdown and maybe on the day). But on this occasion, I only waited 10 minutes as I was fast off the plane.

Once past Immigration, you will find yourself right next to downward escalator leading to the luggage retrieval carousels. As you get on the escalator you will see clearly positoned at eye-level large information boards showing carousel numbers relating to your flight number. In my experience on this occasion, my luggage was waiting for me and also noticed that the carousel has a sensor so that as luggage continues to come down, it is held on the entry ramp until a space is created in the carousel belt. This is ingenious and avoids smashing the luggage especially if you have something fragile in the suitcase. (saying that, the originating port may not be the same so make sure you pack your luggage well).

The weather was cold and crisp but sunny for the whole duration of my trip. Mind you before I left London, just so I would know what to pack, I checked the following websites:

Japanese Weather

I stayed at Mercure Hotel Narita which I would recommend click

Mercure Hotel Narita

if interested. By the way, the hotel layout is quite unusual as it's two separate buildings which are linked therefore make sure that you understand the direction given by the reception. Although the room is quite compact (in keeping with the Japanese habits) it has all the amenities that you may require i.e. wifi, tea and coffee facilities, iron and ironing board, fridge in the room but above all you can rent English Language Videos at the Reception for free. The hotel is situated right at the Village which is literally 5-10 minutes away from the following Temples which might be of interest to you:

Naritasan Shinsho-ji Temple;
Sanju-no-to (the three storied pagoda);
Shaka-do Hall;
Komyo-do Hall;
Gaku-do Hall;
Naritasan Shotoku Taishi-do Hall;
Dai-to Pagoda;
Issai-kyo-do Sutra Hall;
Sogo Reido Sanctuary (Meishozan Tosho-ji Temple), the family temple of Sakura Sogo.

I have a website link for the Temples that might be of interest to you - click

Temples

In the village, there are a good variety of restaurants but mainly Japanese. There's also a Stop Shop which is equivalent to 7-Eleven.



Will be back to post more later,

Alan