Sudden filght - need quick info

Hi all,

Sorry for the general question, but suddenly have to fly to Europe via Tokyo tommorrow, have a few general questions, normally I'd research these, but time against me.

I arrive in Tokyo airport at 4:30 in the afternoon and fly out at 9am the following day, would love to go to the city for the night, is this possible?
If so, anyone recommend anywhere cheapish to stay, I know Tokyo is very expensive, but somewhere on the lower end would be great, and near public tranport to the airport.
If not possible, any ideas for the airport stay,

Cheers again

While I can't recommend anywhere specific to stay, there are a few hotels out near Narita airport. Getting into the city shouldn't be too difficult, though it does take a little while. I recommend taking the train as taxis are expensive (though so is the train). You can either take a regular train line downtown to tokyo station, or take one of two airport express trains (Narita Express or Skyliner). Just be careful as the trains do not run all night, though if you miss one they do start again early in the morning. To me it may make more sense to actually stay downtown.

Cheers for that,

Just having a quick look and may get one of the express trains in and stay the night somewhere downtown and get the first one back out in the morning, any general regions or suggested stops to get off and to look around downtown, backpacker style areas, I realise that the city is huge and may well be spreadout

Any one if this might be close by the Narita express train, or near centre of city, Sakura Hostel Asakusa

Cheers

flying out at 9AM means you wanna be at the airport at 7 or 7:30. Arriving at 16:30 means that if your flight is on time, and you make it out of the airport with little delay, you could be in Tokyo at around 18:30, giving you a maximum of about 12 hours (18:30 - 6:30) to see stuff - when you're not sleeping, that is. Personally, I think you're better off chilling in Narita.

bah, plenty of time to sleep on the plane, especially if you have to hop on a long flight to Europe. That being said, there are a few things worth checking out in the town of Narita if I remember correctly. I only went there once and it wasn't for very long, there's at least a pretty cool looking temple there, but I'd still try to hop on one of those trains downtown. Gumboots was right with the wanting to get into Narita early though. The airport is hit or miss, sometimes you get through customs and check in pretty quickly, sometimes it takes forever.

Narita Layover page might have useful information.

Unless you want to take the first train from Tokyo, you probably want to stay in Narita because to get to the airport at 7 am, you will need to leave at least an hour or more earlier.

Ruth

Cheers for all the advise guys, migth try and make it in and get first train back. As mentioned, long flight to Europe to sleep it off. Flying out of NZ at 6:30 in the morning, so plenty of sleep on the way there also,

Will how quick I can get through the airport and take it from there

Thanks again and happy travelling

4.30pm to 9am. why sleep anywhere?
get a good sleep on the plane, go hard in tokyo, its a true 24hr city, then either push on thru or crash for a while in the airport.
save yourself $100 or put it to enjoying the night.