Tale of Two Lounges - Dulles Airport
Onward to Tokyo - First Class United & ANA Dreamliner
Castle in the Clouds - Park Hyatt Tokyo
Day Trip to Kamakura
Tokyo Hilton
Tale of Two Lounges - Narita Airport
A Blast From the Past - American First Class
The Joan Rivers Hotel - W Chicago Lakeside
Wrap-Up of Trip
I took the Narita Express to the airport from the Hilton. The bus leaves from the Hilton almost on the hour, but it is important to book your ticket in advance.
The check-in area was empty. Empty! Maybe five people in American's entire check-in area:
After checking-in and dropping off the bags, I cleared security and customs with easy. I was told that I could visit the American Airlines Admirals club located in Terminal 2. So, I went there to kill four hours before my flight. Both First and Business class passengers use the lounge space.
The lounge has an open layout with a bank of windows that lets in tons of natural light.
The lounge has amble places to sit, relax and plug in. Wifi strength was strong, so I spent some time checking emails, blogging and surfing the net. They had a few computers for those without laptops.
The food offerings were less ample. Some plastic wrapped sandwiches, sushi, and some hot dish:
A fountain drink machine, some beers, and average type hard liquor:
I was a little disappointed in the offerings. The lounges had a few bathrooms with showers, but I didn't explore them. After an hour, I was bored. As a First Class passenger, I felt like I deserved more. I went to the OneWorld Alliance (which American Airlines is apart of) website to find what other airlines had lounges in the terminal. OneWorld's website has a page devoted to lounges. At Narita, the website showed a handful of lounges
I decided to check out the JAL Sakura Lounge. So I packed up my things and went to find the JAL lounge, which turned out to be an adventure. After 20 minutes of walking around the terminal, I finally asked someone to point me into the direction of the lounge, which literally was right around the corner.
The JAL Lounge hosts both the First Class Lounge and the Business Class Lounge in the same area. With my American Airlines First Class ticket, I was excepting to be invited to the Business Class Lounge. To my surprise, the desk attendant walked me to the First Class Lounge and handed me off to another employee.
One of the first things I did was to ask for a shower. The attendant said it would be no problem and escorted me to my bathroom holding my shower. She point out the toiletries in the bathroom and wished me a happy shower.
The bathroom was not huge, but big enough not to feel cramped. It had a place to store my luggage, hang up my clothes, and maybe do a jumping jack.
The shower felt so nice. I am a big fan of taking showers before flights. Flying clean makes the experience so much better. After my shower, I signed up for a 15 minute complementary massage. They had three options available:
I choice the upper body option and was to the next appointment was at 4:00pm. The attendant invited me to get some food and drink and she would come get me for my appointment.
My first impression was WOW! The lounge screams exclusive.
The lounge was empty. Maybe 10 people tops, but the place could hold 200 easily. The food selection in the JAL lounge made AA's look like inferior.
I decided to grab some tomato soup and candy before my massage:
After my massage, I had some small plates, deserts and a marzipan fruit:
When it was time for my massage, I was lead to small dark room with a table for me to lie on.
The massage was really nice. I am not a big massage fan. I tend to tense up during them, but that never happened during this massage. I didn't tip the guy, was I suppose to? I am never really good with when and how much to tip people.
The drink options were very impressive as well from a basic soda fountain, various juices and coffee machine:
To mid-shelf liquor and wine:
If you want something higher up the shelf, this lounge has a bartender to help with that:
The lounge had places to lock up your luggage, which I did. I liked not having to worry about it.
As you can obviously see, the JAL beats the AA lounge by a long-haul. I walked over the business lounge side and it had the same offerings as the First Class lounge, but it was bigger, more places to sit and multiple bars:
If you are flying out of Narita in AA Business or First Class, I would highly recommend the JAL lounges over the AA lounge. You will have a better time and feel pampered. AA should be ashamed of themselves, spend a little money and give your travels something more than cafeteria food and drink.
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