Not shopping, not eating: Tokyo’s biggest airport has just one purpose
The Airport
Narita International Airport, NRT
The Flight
Malaysia Airlines MH89 from Tokyo to Kuala Lumpur (KUL).
The Arrival
Narita’s disadvantage is its distance (70 kilometres) from central Tokyo; you’d need a bank loan to take a taxi. Fortunately, the land of great trains delivers me in under an hour on the spiffy Narita Express from Tokyo station. It’s four floors up to Terminal 2’s check-in zone. I make a slow glide on long escalators to avoid the lift queue, and am delivered into a cavernous and crowded building: so far, so Tokyo.
Narita Aiport, Tokyo: Not flash, but efficient.Credit: iStock
The Look
Unlike some Asian airports, Narita is no vanity project: Japan is a land of practical, no-frills public buildings. Terminal 2 departures is a humungous, unadorned space with rows of check-in counters and little else, and looks its 30-year age. It’s tired, has no gleam, but it functions.
Check In
Space is tight, and when I arrive at the Malaysia Airlines aisle, economy-class passengers are corralled into a narrow back-and-forward queue tight up against a much shorter business-class line, which I happily join. Six people ahead of me are processed quickly and so am I, thanks to a dedicated suitcase wrangler who deals with baggage tags. Getting beyond the check-in melee is a challenge but, after four days in heaving Tokyo, this barely raises my pulse.
Narita is about 70 kilometres from downtown Tokyo.
Security
The queue strays down the concourse, but is hurried along by polite but firm staff. Each scanning machine has six spaces for passengers to unload their laptops and liquids at the same time into automatically dispensed tubs, and eagle-eyed staff make sure rules are followed so nobody needs items re-scanned. Very efficient.
Food + Drink
I have access to the JAL business lounge whose food, in this land of marvellous food, is disappointingly cafeteria-like. You won’t find much airside: the best plan is to head to the terminal’s fourth floor before security, where abundant regularly-priced restaurants serve tempura, ramen noodles, sushi and international fast food.
Retail Therapy
Whatever shopping you want to do in Tokyo, do it before security at Narita airport unless a Chanel handbag calls. There’s little other than top fashion. Only a single reasonably-priced shop allows you to get rid of your last Japanese coins on trinkets, cheap souvenirs and awful international chocolates. You can buy nicely presented (but still awful) Japanese sweets too.
Passing Time
Given Japan’s reliable trains, you’ve no reason to arrive early but, if you do, bring your knitting. Japanese airports are for catching planes, and that’s all that awaits in Terminal 2, though Terminal 1 has an art gallery and Japanese cultural experiences such as origami and kite making. On the plus side, after staggering down an interminable corridor to my departure gate, there’s no further security scan.
The Verdict
No wow architecture, no flair, no panache, but who cares: this airport is designed to get you into the air with no time wasted.
Our Rating Out Of Five
★★★½
The writer was a guest of Regent Seven Seas Cruises.
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