Smile Hotel Nagano

... showing artifacts and artwork in each of the floors. There were also some English signs which told us some facts about the castle. One of the interesting things were the really steep staircases. I think the steepest one was about 70 degrees! Some of the older tourists had some difficulty going up especially since the staircases were really narrow for two way traffic. I can't imagine samurai soldiers in full armor going up these ...

... nuestro caso la soledad, que contrasta enormemente con la visión de los gigantescos edificios que lo rodean.

Podríamos destacar el estanque de "Shioiri-no-ike" cuya agua es salada y se extrae de la bahía mediante un sistema de exclusas. En el estanque y conectado con un bello puente de madera (118 metros) está la isla de "Nakajima-no-ochaya" donde el que lo desee puede acercarse a la casa ...

... some money on cab fare. Hopefully I can remember to ride on the left side of the street and the other vehicles remember to do the same. I'm also hoping that the rumors of English-speaking guides are true.

Adjusting my expectations... I had thought I'd zip through the castle and get to Kyoto early. Probably not. Everything takes longer than you think.

... Thunfisch wird ja dank d** Fischmethoden imm** we***** - auch ist fraglich ob das ganze Delfinfreundlich abgeht... jaja die Japan** und die Delfine ist ja ein eigenes Thema) ab** es ist einfach zu leck**. Wenn dir d** Fisch direkt auf d** Zunge z**rinnt... Umweltfreundlichkeit ist eh ein zweischneidiges Schw**t, da wird ein**seits alles mögliche eingepackt (wrapping culture Japan!!) selbst wenn man v**packtes eis kauft, wirds nochmal in ein Tütel extra ...

... face, give face, dont loose face... says nowhere dont break promises or dont lie...
Anyway, after she repeated her invitation 3 times i said ok, they paid my beer, i paid my food.
NIce...what annoyed me was that she was inching closer and closer to me sexual harassment from a over 50 years old japanese lady?
whowww....
She then wanted to sing karaoke, so up we went, after some time i got a bill over 1700 yen, 17 dollar, went down and off she went without even saiing ...

... in the onsen and up the verges in their group, and there were lots of cute little babies. We stayed for a while taking photos, but soon got drenched by the rain so took shelter in an onsen lodge just across a bridge on the other side of the valley. There we had lunch- by then we hadnt eaten all day as we had the money fiasco to deal with in the morning, and had rushed to get our train and bus- so we ...

... and pictures of japanese ladies. We spent the afternoon exploring the town and Mark had a chestnut icecream- the place is also reknowned for its chestnut confectionary. By this point we had spent all of the cash we had on us and were directed to 2 atms nearby, however neither would accept our cards (all visa) even though they had the visa logo on them. These were the only places to get money out in the whole town and we had no other way of getting any, arggh! So we ...

... from 9-5pm and we naturally got there too late.

I love bullet trains in Japan. We got from Nagano back to Tokyo in the space of an hour and a half and summing up enough energy we found our ludicrously small hostel with a kitchen meant for 40 guests consisting of two hobs and a hot plate and crawled into bed exhausted!


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... were cruising around looking for a 'love hotel' - from what I have heard though, driving a foreign couple 200km out of your way is probably more exciting that an hour of Japanese lovemaking! Nagano was nice enough - nice shrine, lots of funny signs, Balinese restaurant, Raccoon-dog that Myree and Art would have loved, kids looking cool playing guitar games in the game arcades (as in "Lost in Translation"). The most fun part was our ...

We took the Shinkansen to Nagano using our rail pass and after arriving found out which bus to catch out to M-Wave, the ice skating rink used in the winter Olympics. We had never been ice skating so were willing to give it a try.

Took an old wooden floored bus out to M-Wave and walked past a sign in Japanese then paid for our ticket to the ...