Early birds get paid… I was waiting for the lift to open today again. But today I was alone. The rest? Stayed in bed and watched TV.

Anyway, I took the opportunity to enjoy yet another sunny day in the slopes. Or at least the 2 first hours of it. The lift opened at 8 am and by 10 am I was done. Not so much because I was exhausted but our checkout time was 11 am.

Also, already by 10 am the snow started to get wet and the slopes started to get crowded. I enjoyed the 2 best hours of the day 🙂

From the top you could have a great view of the “Japanese Alps”, stretching out as a white-topped mountain wall in the horizon. It was such a great day I didn’t really mind it not being the best snowboarding. It was just great being out in the fresh air with all the white snow 😎

By 2 pm I was back in Tokyo. Returning directly home. Then waiting for Chie to get back home so we could have a dinner together. Tonight we went to Il Lupone, an Italian restaurant not far from home. Yummy!

Oh, I almost forgot… On our way down from Shiga Kogen we saw two monkeys, Japanese Macaque. The first was probably a teenager, quite small and living life on the edge running around on road. The other was fully grown and sitting on the railings on the side of the road. Unfortunately I did not get the camera up in time, so you just have to trust me 🙂

Yesterday it was snowing the whole day but today it was nothing but blue sky everywhere. And it had snowed about 10 cm during the night so it was a great morning. We all started it by being the first to get on the lift.

At first I went with my friends but they wanted to ski in the ski only area after a while so I continued on my own. I found a great back country area with powder snow (though not as powdery as in Niseko).

At lunch time the powder snow had turned in to quite wet and heavy snow, though still quite soft. And my legs had turned in to jelly (more leg exercises in the gym to prepare for next snowboard season). It was time to meet my friends for some food.

Woke up a little bit earlier today than I usually do. I was catching an early train to Nagano to go snowboarding with some friends. As usual we met at the Nagano station and rode by car to Shiga Kogen.

By noon we’d had lunch and were hitting the slopes. It was snowing a gently the whole afternoon. But it was still good visibility and easy snowboamrding.

We were riding together the whole afternoon. The seven of us. 3 girls and 4 guys, 2 snowboarders and 5 loosers on skis 😉

Around 4 pm we had enough and went back to our rooms. Cleaned up in the artificial onsen (hot and outdoors but not natural), together with a whole lot of other people. Then had time to relax and talk in the room before going for dinner.

The restaurant was in the building next to the hotel so we had to walk aoutside for 25 meters. It was snowing, and quite beautiful. The food was Chinese and I had a chance to try Brian’s Sudden Death Sauce, a gift from Hachobori-san. Tasty. And HOT!!!

After dinner we all met up in the guys’ room. Drinking (sports drink for me and stronger variants of what everyone claimed to be sports drinks, though I am still doubtful ;-)). Talking. and having a fun time.