My trip this week did not get off to a very good start.

After working in the office on Monday I headed off to the airport for a flight to Tokyo.

I was excited as I would be flying into the Haneda airport for the first time. All the times I have flown into Tokyo have been to the Narita airport.

I also liked the fact that I would be flying on a 777 and getting better in-flight entertainment than on a 747.

Here is the aircraft parked at the gate ready for us to start loading.

I had been checking my United app and there were a lot of open seats in Economy Plus. In fact, I had a who row to myself and was looking forward to a comfortable flight.

We took off and about 20 minutes into the flight there was an announcement for the purser to call the captain. I didn’t think much of it until a while later we got an announcement that we had to return to the San Francisco Airport. There was a faulty engine sensor that was reporting the wrong values. We dumped fuel and headed back. Definitely better to be safe.

I thought back through my many flights and have never taken off and landed at the same place on a commercial flight. I have done it a few times in private aircraft though. I have also landed at a different airport than intended at least three times.

Once we got back it was time for the long re-booking line and luckily it didn’t take too long. I was re-booked on a morning flight and was shuttled off to a hotel.

I really liked the location of the hotel and if I had a day to spend there it would have been great. However, it was far from the airport which meant I had a 5:30am pickup to return to the airport.

This was not the view I expected from my hotel room after my flight.

The next morning it was back to the airport for a flight to LAX to connect to Tokyo. Instead of flying into Haneda I was now setting off to Narita.

The seat map was also much different. There were not as many seats left on the flight as many people were sent down to LAX because of the cancelled flight.

There was one really nice thing about the flight though. The flight was on a 787. This was my second time to fly on a Boeing 787. You can click on the following link to see my post about my First 787 Flight.

Two things in the above picture will tell you that it is a 787. First the blue tint to the picture as it was taken through the unique windows of a 787. Secondly, the shape of the wing. I really like the shape of the wing, especially when in flight.

After the long flight it was then time for a bus ride. I took the limousine bus to the New Otani hotel in Tokyo and then walked to the hotel that I am staying at.

After a nice meal at a curry shop I am ready for some rest.

It has been a very long trip, at least I am in one place for the next week.

Steven