The week days were finally here and we had two years of pent up skiing frustration. It was necessary, for our health that we got onto those slopes.

The hotel was a winner all round, a huge Ryokan style room with Onsens to bathe our weary legs and charming hosts who assisted our every whim.

The main positive about this little hotel was its location; it was almost comparable to Boulevard. We were taken 10 metres away to get our ski hire fitted and with a quick few buttons from the hotel owner we had our ski pass in our highly fashionable ski jackets-there was no stopping us…. Until we got onto the slopes and we were greeted by hundreds of people, queues stretching a mile long at the lifts and awful snow both on and off piste. Oh no, wait a minute it was the exact opposite of that-empty slopes, maximum of one person ahead of us at the lifts, beautiful soft snow on piste and despite being quite tracked out in parts, lovely fluffy powder off piste. The sun shined on us for about three quarters of our skiing time so we couldn't complain too much when there was a serious whiteout. We thanked the ski Gods and our lovely owners and took the longest, but cheapest route to Nagano-got to make full use of the JR rail pass after all!

A few things to mention before moving on to the next blog;

1) I nailed a 360……………………… on the ground not the air.

2) We had a delicious cheap meal at a local restaurant that Koichi dropped us off at and then we got a free tour of Hakuba via the night bus on our way home.

3) The second night we were saving on money so had pot noodles in our room!

4) Koichi nearly massively undercharged us but we were too honest and confessed everything-he still didn't charge for any of the clothes rental as I donated my old salopettes and finally

5) James won the 'stacking it' game with a total of six, I came in short with only two. James response-'it was the ski's' hmm, poor workman I say!