Our early morning began with us vacating our Diamond Princess cabin around 8:15am and heading to breakfast. As we figured the Buffet area would be packed with people, we headed to the one Main Dining Room that was serving breakfast. Usually we just get off the ship and eat something when we get home, on the road, or at our hotel, but our shuttle bus to the airport wasn’t until 9:30am, so we had a bit of time for breakfast. The Dining Room was actually a good option as it wasn’t overly crowded and was definitely more relaxing than the buffet area would have been.
After breakfast, we headed to our designated departure lounge, which was one of the other Main Dining Rooms, and we had only a five minute wait or so before they called our departure number. Surprisingly we didn’t have a wait for either elevator, which we were a bit concerned about on departure day, as these were the old-type elevators, not the “Smart Elevators” they have on newer ships, which are much more efficient.
The departure off of the Diamond Princess was quite orderly and quick, however the busy luggage pickup area did not have enough porters for assistance with all of our luggage. We found our luggage fairly quickly in the terminal, but it took a while to find a self service luggage cart, which Steve DOS found two near the entrance as people returned them after their use.
The line for Customs was quick, and we found and boarded or shuttle for We found our shuttle bound for Haneda airport, one of several going there. The bus driver and a couple staff close by helped him load our checked luggage onto the bus. Our bus was only half full with passengers when we left, due to the heavy volume of passenger luggage it was storing in its cargo hold.
Soon we were on our way to Haneda Airport, leaving the Diamond Princess and the city of Yokohama behind us. It seemed not so long ago we were staying there in Yokohama, viewing the Sky Tower and old cruise liner museum, The NYK Hikawa Maru docked in port there. but that was 12 days ago, and we’d seen a lot on our Princess cruise since then.
The trip to Haneda Airport took about an hour, and fortunately the post rush hour traffic was fairly light. I think everyone on the bus was flying out that day except us, but as we were staying at an airport hotel overnight, we were dropped off at Terminal 3 like everyone else.
Once at the airport, we again got two luggage carts, this time curbside by our bus. The rest of the passengers on the bus got their luggage and then headed in the terminal for their flight home or elsewhere, but we took our time getting our luggage as we weren’t in a hurry to catch a flight.
We then went inside and looked around a bit in Terminal 3, where we would be departing from in the morning. International Terminal 3 was huge and had many different carriers scattered about, so we went to find ANA where we would check-in in at 8am tomorrow.
We then walked over to our hotel, the Royal Park Hotel, which was conveniently attached to Terminal 3. We pushed our carts with us, and were glad the hotel staff let us store the our luggage on our car, as check-in time was not until 3pm, and it was only around 11am by this time.
We were in no rush to check-in our airport hotel as we had to go back to the Hyatt Regency Hotel Tokyo, to retrieve some items we had left there prior to the cruise. the Hyatt Regency Tokyo was an hour or so via an airport hotel bus service that had a route of several hotels in the Shinjuku area. We did check our luggage at the Royal Park Hotel, so it was much easier getting to and from the bus to Tokyo.
The reason we had to go back to the Hyatt Regency Tokyo, was because I had mistakenly left two cubes of clothes there when we checked out and went to Yokohama, prior to our cruise. Basically 5 of my favorite Polo-branded shirts were in one cube and another Polo shirt, jeans, and a pair of travel pants were in another cube left behind, and waiting for pickup at our first Japan Hotel stay. (I had contacted the Hyatt Regency Tokyo via email from Yokohama, and they confirmed my clothes were left there, and I could pick them up on my return when we were leaving the day prior to our flight from the Haneda Airport.)
We took the “Airport Limousine” Shuttle Bus back to Tokyo, which was super convenient. I wish we had known about them on our inbound flight from Haneda; they are a shared bus service to area hotels that is quick, clean, and super efficient. You check-in with an agent in the pickup area, or more likely reserve a spot online, and it assigns you a bus and a time that is going your direction. While it may stop at 3 or 4 hotels, it’s very quick and they store and retrieve your luggage from the cargo hold, similar to the charter bus we had from the ship. Airport Limousine has loads of busses and go all over Tokyo to some of the major attractions and nearby cities; highly recommended by us! (No referral bonus or sponsorship on our part, we were just impressed how efficient they were, and with lots of times it’s easy to find a bus to their online site.)
Once we were back at the Tokyo Hyatt Regency, we felt a bit of Déjà vu, as we had stayed here two weeks ago, prior to our cruise. Yes, that meant I did not have these clothes for the entire cruise and our 2 night stay in Yokohama, but I learned to manage with what I had. Fortunately since we stayed at the Hyatt in Tokyo, plus a night each at the TWA Hotel in New York, and a night at the Hyatt Orlando Airport prior, I had other dirty clothes I got laundered aboard the ship, plus a couple clean shirts in my carry-on bag.
We had forgotten how busy Tokyo was, but jolted to reality watching a crosswalk from the bus near the Hyatt where we stayed.
At the Hyatt in Tokyo, we went to the Concierge desk as directed in my email, and my clothes were waiting for me, and even wrapped nicely and put in two Hyatt Regency bags!
After picking up my clothes, we walked over to a Sizzler Restaurant close to the hotel. We had seen this restaurant when we were staying at the Hyatt, but had not been there. By now, it was during the busy lunch hour, so we had a short wait, but we were not in a hurry as we were spending the night at the airport hotel.
We had our Westernized lunch; a sirloin steak with huge salad bar and soft drinks and dessert included. The Sizzler restaurant was similar in style and food choices (with a few more Japanese selections thrown in), but was definitely more pricey and its downtown Shinjuku location more upscale than back home in the US.
After lunch, we took another Airport Limousine bus from the Hilton next door. back to Haneda Airport Terminal 3. The Hilton Concierge helped us arrange the pickup via the website, although it’s quite intuitive on your iPhone. I think she saw DOS struggling with his iPhone and offered to help!
Once at Haneda Terminal 3, we again walked a short distance over to our hotel, the Royal Park Hotel Tokyo Airport. A sign indicates you use one of the half dozen kiosks to check-in, but DOS went straight to the Front Desk as we had luggage to pickup anyway. As it was after 3pm. our room was now ready, and we checked in for one night only, our final night in Japan.
To say the room was small is an understatement, and made our tiny TWA room at JFK Airport look like a mega-suite! We wheeled our 2 luggage carts on the elevator up to level four, both Steve DOS and myself each requiring our own elevator to fit us and the luggage cart inside!😂. We somehow managed to fit the two carts inside the tiny room, but it was quite a chore trying to navigate to the bathroom, with the carts in the way. We took the luggage off of the carts, and pushed the two carts together so everything would fit.
Fortunately this was just a one night stay. The room itself was nice, clean, and offered some toiletry amenities in the tiny bathroom, as well as robes that were placed on each of our two twin beds with a single pillow each, but the rooms were clearly made for a single Japanese traveler who is used to small spaces, and must pack much lighter than us for their trips. 😆
We asked for more towels, via a texting app, and they were delivered in less than 5 minutes by a robot! How’s that for service?!
For dinner we ended up eating at the Hotel’s restaurant, just off of the lobby, actually in a corridor towards Terminal 3. Steve DOS had previously been over to the Terminal 3’s food court and restaurant area, that was on level 5, and pre-security, but there really wasn’t anything westernized to eat there, shy of a burger place, so we stuck with the Royal Park’s restaurant.
We had an ok dinner with Malbec wine, and people-watched other diners and passengers walking past on their way to the hotel, tired from their inbound flights no doubt.
Steve DOS had the Japanese Shrimp Tempura, while I had a pepperoni pizza. Both were served with chopsticks! LOL!😂
Back at the room, it was quite soundproof, and we set our alarms for 6:00am, as we had a 10am international flight home, and the flight check-in started at 8am. We planned on skipping the hotel restaurant’s breakfast, and having it in the ANA Airline’s lounge after we checked-in for our flight. We readied our carryon bags for our long flight in the morning; with one clear bag with our 3.4 ounce liquids, and only the things we really needed on the flight; i.e. power cords, extra shirt, undies, and shorts and a T-shirt for the long flight to sleep in, iPhone, my MacBook and iPad, Tylenol etc, and we were soon asleep.
おやすみ Oyasumi ie. Good Night!