Today was a rest day from skiing and we went to see the snow monkeys. The hotel took us up to the bus stop cos it was a long way. The bus trip was back through Nagano and we got some good views of the Japanese alps. The trip was about 2 hours to Jigokadani then a half hour walk up a steep, narrow, winding and icey track. The monkeys have their own onsen and they are the only monkeys in the world that do this. Story goes they started doing it about 40 years ago and have kept doing it ever since. They were super cute then we had to walk back down the ****** track.
Lunch was at the 240 year old Masuichi Sake Brewery. It was the newest most pristine building I have seen in a while. That said lunch was OK and after we did some bartering with the locals for supplies.
The 1400 year old Zenkoji temple was built down the road. Unfortunately it was moved 300 years ago but some of the artefacts are 1400 years old. Like all buddhist temples it is built without any nails. The main gate burnt down 100 years ago so that was rebuilt also.
All in all it was a pretty good tour and at 10000 yen each pretty good value.
Today was very hot..13deg and we are expecting about 8 for the next couple of days so skiing doesnt look great at least it will be minus overnight to freeze the snow.