Hotel kanda Asahikawa

... hidden by snow for all I know, I spent a good 15 minutes fearing I'd turn up as a frozen corpse come the Spring melt. But I got throught it, got back on the path and didn't detour from it again.

After that it was still early and sunny so cross country hiked around the local swamps, which was nice, but not really that interesting. The thing about walking is that it's not a task that takes your attention. I like cooking becuase you have a task and it forced out ...

... dropping the car in Asahikawa, we checked into our first business hotel. Tiny, but serviceable, I was delighted to discover I could stand up in the step-up-into tiny bathroom. The best thing about the hotel was its Japanese/Western breakfast buffet, which made up for its frequent mediocrity with its great variety. Well stuffed, we then caught the bus to Daisetszan National Park. Arriving in the middle of a ...

... igualito, pero sin gente roncando a mi alrededor. Lo que alli no tenian son los banyos de agua caliente que aqui si. Son banyos compartidos, curiosos porque te duchas sentado en un taburete de plastico y tras enjuagarte y limpiarte bien el jabon, te metes a remojo en la banyera, llena de agua super caliente, a modo de sauna. Cuando te ha bajado la tension, es buen momento de ir a por el cafe (todo sea dicho, malisimo) Y el resto del dia, si no ...

We're in Sapporo now and it's absolutely amazing. However the hostel is charging ten yen per freaking minute to use the internet - which adds up to roughly $10 AUD an hour. So there won't be any further posts until we reach Tokyo again in another three days.

Missing you all,
Tom and Rachael

We're in Sapporo now and it's absolutely amazing. However the hostel is charging ten yen per freaking minute to use the internet - which adds up to roughly $10 AUD an hour. So there won't be any further posts until we reach Tokyo again in another three days.

Missing you all,
Tom and Rachael

... need to be naked. The only difference is that, you don't really need to mix up with guys actually. They are seperated into ladies and gents division but of course you got to be naked when you are in it. So, it's either you let people see what you have, or you pay the trip to stay in your hotel room.

... call it a ropeway here) that leads up to a 2-person chairlift that goes almost to the top. Once we got on the tram I was very surprised to find that we were the only -the only- people skiing the mountain that day. In my 20 years of throwing myself down snowy slopes this is the first time my group had a hill all to ourselves. We went straight to the top and were pleasantly surprised (understatement) to find that it had ...

... to the grocery store which was interesting indeed. The NZ grocery stores were far more similar than different to American ones. The main things being there were Indian and Thai food in the international aisle instead of Mexican. Here pretty much everything is different and in pretty much every row there is something that makes you think "so what the heck is that?" I've made some minor mistakes so far, like the two times I've tried to buy cheese I ended up with ...

Well, I've grown a bit taller in the last few days. I've also forgotten how to speak and read. I'm in Asahikawa now but let's go back to Minneapolis where I had to wake up really early in the morning to catch my first flight to Chicago. I had a 2 hour layover in Chi and for some reason I just totally started freaking out there. I was extremely nervous and rightfully so in my mind. However it just didn't really hit me until I got there. The flight was very long, 13.5 hours, and ...

That was the first time to take a flight in my life. It was very nervous at the time the airplane took off the ground and I also experienced compressed air in my earhole on the flight for the first time. Sapporo had a snow festival with a lot of snow sculptures and ice sculptures in ...