Trip to Hakuba, Nagano.
Last weekend was super random. We got a very cheap cancelation at a Japanese Ryokan (hotel) that had breakfast and lunch and a skii lift pass in Nagona for 6000ish yen. It was super cheap. So....Rin and I went off to Hakuba in Nagano (where the olympics were) in search of some snow and a place to snowboard.
So on Friday, at the grand time of 2am.. we drove up to Nagano...I slept most of the way, but poor Rin continued to drive and we arrived about 9am.
Wooo pretty mountains.
We got to the Ryokan and checked in. Then it was time to snowboard! Surprisingly in Scotland I never once Snowboarded or went skiing. So this was my 3rd time to go snowboarding. Lets just say I was kind of scared to be going again..seeing as the last time I went was a year ago.
Our ryokan.
After getting our gear sorted and passes...we went up to the skii slope and jumped on the extremely crowed skii lift.
Me in my extremely fancy snow gear (woo burton). After about 10 times of falling, I started to get my confidence back and managed to stay upright. I have a terrible fear of turning onto my front when boarding. Its more painful to fall frontwards than backwards. It took a while to get over that initial fear, but half way through the day I got over it and managed to snowboard properlly.
Yup...thats me. You would never be able to tell right?
On one of the slopes it was just pure white powder snow.... So when in powder...have a snowfight!
I lost. This is me under about a meter of snow....
more recognisable now eh?
Well at least I didnt look like ET like Rin!
At about 4.30ish it was time to head back to the ryokan and get ready as we were meeting up with Migs!!!
Rin with his car cleaning ice scraping thing.
Me in my thermals! It was pretty cold but I couldnt go into the car in my trousers...:(
Back at the hotel we quickly ran for a bath and got changed. Our room was really nice!!
Snow and fairy lights :)
Then it was drinking time! After a long walk and a random drive to Migs work, we finally met up with him and headed off to "The pub" in Happoone. It was awesome. There was much catching up, meeting some of his friends was cool (bar one asshole english guy , but noone liked him) and also drinking lots and lots of Jagermiefer. Jager Bomb anyone? We also chilled out and danced to some random Reggae.
After an extremely long wait the nights entertainment started and we watched a reggae band play. They were pretty good but some of the music sounded like anime + video game theme tunes!
Reggae yey!
We then said our goodbyes to migs and headed back to the ryokan. Unfortunatly we got lost and almost ended up stranded up a snowy street...but we finally managed to get back and sleep we did!
The drive back from Hakuba to Gifu was long, but fun. The views were stunning.
This was how high the snow was in the morning.
The mountain we snowboarded on.
Most of the roads were worse than this.
Our trusty mascot Sento-kun joined us on our journey.
We did have a few pitt stops, of which we had some extremely strange food and drink.
Miso pan. Bread made with Miso paste. Yum Yum.
Maple Milk Tea which was low in calorie and absolutly disgusting. eww...It was like a chemical factory exploding in your mouth. Not recommended.
Soft, Milk strawberry cream dogs in rirakuma packaging... this was heaven. Really heaven. I would suggest eating these if you can!
Overall our short trip to Nagano was a whole lot of fun. It was really great to see Migs while he was still in Nagano. Just needed to have Eubi there and it would have just been like old times but with snowboards. Maybe next time :)
So on Friday, at the grand time of 2am.. we drove up to Nagano...I slept most of the way, but poor Rin continued to drive and we arrived about 9am.
Wooo pretty mountains.
We got to the Ryokan and checked in. Then it was time to snowboard! Surprisingly in Scotland I never once Snowboarded or went skiing. So this was my 3rd time to go snowboarding. Lets just say I was kind of scared to be going again..seeing as the last time I went was a year ago.
Our ryokan.
After getting our gear sorted and passes...we went up to the skii slope and jumped on the extremely crowed skii lift.
Me in my extremely fancy snow gear (woo burton). After about 10 times of falling, I started to get my confidence back and managed to stay upright. I have a terrible fear of turning onto my front when boarding. Its more painful to fall frontwards than backwards. It took a while to get over that initial fear, but half way through the day I got over it and managed to snowboard properlly.
Yup...thats me. You would never be able to tell right?
On one of the slopes it was just pure white powder snow.... So when in powder...have a snowfight!
I lost. This is me under about a meter of snow....
more recognisable now eh?
Well at least I didnt look like ET like Rin!
At about 4.30ish it was time to head back to the ryokan and get ready as we were meeting up with Migs!!!
Rin with his car cleaning ice scraping thing.
Me in my thermals! It was pretty cold but I couldnt go into the car in my trousers...:(
Back at the hotel we quickly ran for a bath and got changed. Our room was really nice!!
Snow and fairy lights :)
Then it was drinking time! After a long walk and a random drive to Migs work, we finally met up with him and headed off to "The pub" in Happoone. It was awesome. There was much catching up, meeting some of his friends was cool (bar one asshole english guy , but noone liked him) and also drinking lots and lots of Jagermiefer. Jager Bomb anyone? We also chilled out and danced to some random Reggae.
After an extremely long wait the nights entertainment started and we watched a reggae band play. They were pretty good but some of the music sounded like anime + video game theme tunes!
Reggae yey!
We then said our goodbyes to migs and headed back to the ryokan. Unfortunatly we got lost and almost ended up stranded up a snowy street...but we finally managed to get back and sleep we did!
The drive back from Hakuba to Gifu was long, but fun. The views were stunning.
This was how high the snow was in the morning.
The mountain we snowboarded on.
Most of the roads were worse than this.
Our trusty mascot Sento-kun joined us on our journey.
We did have a few pitt stops, of which we had some extremely strange food and drink.
Miso pan. Bread made with Miso paste. Yum Yum.
Maple Milk Tea which was low in calorie and absolutly disgusting. eww...It was like a chemical factory exploding in your mouth. Not recommended.
Soft, Milk strawberry cream dogs in rirakuma packaging... this was heaven. Really heaven. I would suggest eating these if you can!
Overall our short trip to Nagano was a whole lot of fun. It was really great to see Migs while he was still in Nagano. Just needed to have Eubi there and it would have just been like old times but with snowboards. Maybe next time :)