Hi all. Just wanted to update everyone about how things went if ever it could help you in the future. My trip to Mexico City was uneventful and the only problem is there was a long layover and the check-in counters for NH do not open until 3 hours before the flight. There are no seats available to sit on in the waiting area so I went to a Chili’s that is open 24 hours and ate and sat there until check-in opened. At check-in they did ask me some questions as the transit is an “odd” route, but when I explained why I was taking that route they were fine with it. They wanted to see my UA ticket and I showed them and they even checked me into that flight and printed by boarding pass. All in all was much smoother than I expected.

The plane might have had 10 passengers total, with 3 in business class. The attentive service with so few passengers was amazing and it seemed comparable to what I experienced before in first class. Upon landing in NRT they asked transit passengers to deplane first and they looked at my UA boarding pass at the exit and let me off the plane. Going to transit security was eerie as I did not see one other passenger. The same was true as I walked the airport I did not see one other passenger on my way to the NH lounge. I waited there about 7 hours for my wife to arrive and she was there right in time. We were so happy the plan worked and we went to our UA flight which was fairly empty and was uneventful but I found the service to be good for UA standards. In EWR the immigration area was so quiet and we were through the whole process in 10 minutes, which included the time in the back room where they processed her visa.

I’m glad this worked since she had a lot of baggage and it was a struggle even for me to handle it. We are now home together and I wanted to thank everyone on this thread for the guidance provided.