Third day of skiing and New Year
We weren’t sure on the first day if we would want three days of skiing, and if we did whether we would want the third day to be a lesson day or not so we left it till just before to decide. We knew by the start of the second day that we wanted a third day and decided to have it as a day where we could just mess about by ourselves. So after an early breakfast at the lodge, we headed out! I forgot to say that I’d had breakfast there yesterday too, but I hadn’t specified that it was only me as Mitch can’t stomach food in the morning so Owner had waited ages for Mitch to come and eventually asked and I felt really bad as he must have been getting a little anxious! Oops! Lesson learnt!
Breakfast
We got there and I tried to see if we could update our 2 day ski lift pass to a 3 day but sadly we couldn’t we just had to buy the full price 1 day version. But never mind! They were little square plastic chips that you stick in a pocket and then wave at the machine but Mitch had his in his breast pocket so always had to rub himself up against the machine; it didn’t get any less funny!
Our ski lift tokens
We looked at the map and found the way to the very top of the mountain, we had only been about halfway up on the previous two days, and we wanted a real adventure. So on the gondola, on the ski lift, on the new and scary ski lift and then on one more! We knew there was a food place a little way down, and then a little further down from that is the final ski lift to the peak. So we got all the way up the one that drops you off above the restaurant, slid down a bit, ate some thick and yummy pizza, bought me a blue neck tube scarf thing, skiid down a little more and prepared for the highest ski lift of the mountain! All the slopes were new to us so we didn’t know what to expect but the challenges proved to be good fun!
When we got to the very top we didn’t expect it but the weather had really turned. I took a photo to show it but there was so much fog you could only see a little way in front! And so we set off…… It was much like the beginner slope with a few of the other slopes stuck in there; there were some gentle bits, some very steep bits and then bits where everyone had to walk!! It was so much more exhausting than we had anticipated too, we went down the entire mountain in one! We got to the bottom and had some more food and a good rest about 1.30pm; in our favourite cheesy hash brown place of course!
We might have been knackered out by the mega long first run, but we were far from done! We went back up to the mid-range bit to play. And I really mean play! We went over loads of jumps, in and out of the cross-country bits, up and down the banks (with plenty of screaming from me! I once went far higher than I intended, scared myself silly and promptly did it again because it was really fun!). We spent ages up there just messing about and really enjoying what we’d learnt which was great. We even ran into our teacher from the first day and we told her about our engagement! She was really really excited and happy for us bless her, she’s such a warm person, I hope we get to meet her again one day. On the final run down we took some timer selfies, we tried to get ourselves jumping and it took so many tries!! We had a hilarious time getting it right; we must have looked like right plonkers. We took some time to soak in the views too, everything about this place was beautiful. On the final leg of our final run down, we crossed the last bit of the intermediate slope that looked so steep to us and I was itching to try it! My legs were ready way before my head was and I could feel my body warring with my brain to go down it and just go for it! I said as much to Mitch and told him that if my legs were ready then I must be too, just my brain hadn’t caught on yet and off I went!! I’m so glad I did, I would have regretted not going for the whole rest of the journey, if not forever! It was just as steep as it looked and I basically snow plowed all the way down, but I did it!! Mitch went down the normal slope and met me at the bottom, ready to say goodbye to skiing for this holiday…
On the way home, we asked Owner if he could take us somewhere that would sell Cassis, a fancy and very very yummy alcohol that they often do with orange juice in karaoke bars; we wanted to have something to celebrate the New Year with! So he kindly took us to a shop he knew that sold all kinds of booze and waited in the car while we looked. We found 2 kinds and bought both to compare  them. as well as some orange juice, coke and red bull to mix with.
Our New Year’s prep!
New Year in Japan is sort of like our Christmas; Basically reverse the traditions for Christmas and New Year and you get Japan’s holidays! They spend Christmas partying with their friends and don’t have any special traditions as such, but New Year is for family, they have food that they always eat every year and they go to a shrine at midnight. Needless to say Mitch and I were keen to take part in this! Owner was making a New Year dinner so we had some of that, it was delicious! We also met some of the other residents that had come over the last couple of days and the whole evening was warm and friendly 🙂 One of the ladies there was exactly like Mitch’s mum if she were Japanese! Everything from her voice to her mannerisms to her slippers were perfect, it was uncanny!
After dinner Mitch and I planned to go to the shrine for midnight. We walked there as it wasn’t too far and only took us about half an hour. It was a beautiful walk, there was a giant river with mounds of snow and ice on it, snow drifts everywhere and the closer we got to town the more people having fun there were! There seemed to be some kind of party procession which we ended up in, something about going up a gondola to see fireworks but as it was 11.55 we didn’t think we’d make it in time and went to our little shrine instead. We were glad we did, we joined the back of a queue that was about 30 people long, and before we’d gotten half way through the queue was down the road and out of sight! The group behind us gleefully gave us the New Year greeting and were even more gleeful when I replied! We chatted a bit and then some fireworks went off; presumably the ones from the gondola, but there were only a few so we were glad we were in the shrine at midnight rather than in a gondola 🙂 It was a great New Year all in all! When we got to the top to make our wish, someone had made a little snowman and popped him on the lip of the building; all very cute! We got given a bit of paper by the priest when we had finished which is for good luck and so on and then we went down and bought some charms from the gift shop too. Mitch got a general one and I got one for technical skills; hoping it will help me with things like skiing, photography and such! After asking some people to take photos of us at the entrance we walked back home and fell exhausted into comfy beds. ‘Twas a fun day!
Part 9, coming soon!
Maisy In Japan 
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