Bell Cottage Village Hakuba-mura

... togeth 1000yen (7 quid) for dinner- 2 bowls of noodles, and then went to sleep broke and dreading that we would be stuck there forever. In the morning we arose early to try and get money but no-one could speak any english, nightmare! In the end there was one man from the bank who came and showed us where there was a 3rd atm, that we were unaware of, and sure enough it ejected those lovely yen notes for us :). We were very relieved, and went back to get our bags then left!

... icone (symbolisant la mort et la renaissance tout en s'etant connecte avec Bouddha...). Bref, tres interessant ! On a aussi assiste a la priere de fermeture du temple pour la nuit : chants, percussions et cymbales creant une atmosphere spirituelle tres particuliere. Mais voila, ca sera tout pour Nagano, il n'existe meme pas de cartes postables de la ville !

... story attached to it involved a raccoon that could turn itself human. So it did and wanted to visit Zenkoji, which he loved so much that he wanted to donate a lantern. But he was resting in an inn and decided to bathe in his racoon form. Of course, he was found out and had to flee and never realize his dream of donating the lantern. The head priest, who knew of the racoon's desire, decided to commission one in his honor, not that the raccoon would ever ...

... and snow, but you have ropes either side to help you up onto the trail and also along the path. There is a sudden drop to one side which is covered in trees with lots of things to spot along the way. Naturally I didn't spot anything but i'm sure they're there!!

The monkeys come down into the pool every 2 hours or so when fed and are absolutely hilarious to watch. The actual area stinks of ammonia and you have to be careful not to tred in poo ...

... Kel calls it a Jurassic joint or tyrannosaurus joint or something), it was time to go sightseeing through south west Japan, which was also grouse. We went to Kyoto (more temples, shrines, castles and palaces then you can poke a seated Japanese snowboarder at), Hiroshima (Thankfully levelled by the Americans in '45 so that they could start again without those troublesome aforementioned temples, palaces, historical sites, small laneways, buildings or people ...

I am going to keep the chat to a minimum here and let the (many) photos do the talking. I went to Nagano to see the "Snow Monkeys". They were awesome. After a short 2km hike through snowy forested mountains, suddenly there were monkeys running across the path - and they literally came within an inch of my feet! Well worth the visit.

Parie en randonnee tres top ce matin car il n'y a qu'un seul train qui vas vers la station ou la randonnee commence. une fois arriver a la montagne, on doit prendre un gondole et 2 chair lift pour se rendre au point de depart du sentier. De la je me suis rendu au sommet a 2700m en 2 heures puis je suis revenue en 1heure et demi. Le temps de revenir a la gare et faire un peu d'epicerie, il est deja 17h00.

Aujoud'hui, il fait tres beau, pas trop chaud,18 celcius. Je suis partie en randonnee au mont Goryu, la base de la montagne est a 5 min a pied de l'auberge. C'est 6.2 km pour se rendre au sommet de 2007m d'altitude. Apres avoir marcher mes 12.4 km, je suis arriver en bas, ou il y a une piscine pour l'entrainement de saut en ski.

Enfin rendu a destination apres une heures et demi de plus. J'ai donc fait plus de 7 heures de train dans ma journee, pour me rendre ici, a hakuba, pres de nagano, ou les olympiques d'hiver de 1998 ont eu lieux. La temprature est beaucoup plus clemente, environ 18 le jours et 10 la nuits, ca va faire chagement des 25 et plus depuis mon arriver. Il fait noir, alors on ne voir pas grand chose mais les autres residents de l'auberge m'ont dis que le paysage est pas mal beau. On vera ca demain!

... and ice-skating rink. We went through the rather disappointing museum and through to the ice skating rink to find the lights off and half the ice melted. It was then that we realised that the sign out the front in Japanese probably said the rink was closed due to maintenance.

We left M-Wave, had lunch and then had to wait ages for another ...