After that last post it's been pretty hard to find anything worth posting. The sun doesn't seem as bright, coke tastes flat, my coco pops don't pop, music is monotonous. Only 6 months until Niseko powder season though.
Just kidding, I lost this piece of pooh in the midst of setting this up
http://aliveaustralia.com. But, I finally got around to organising a few images from our Japan trip in April this year. The weather was way out of character for spring, super cold in the beginning, it snowed a foot on our wedding day - the first time it's snowed that late in Yamagata since 1969. Then, by the end of the trip the thermometer hit over 30 degrees, way warm for Golden Week. We had fun tripping around to some places we'd never seen before. Enough words, here are a few photos:
Mt Fuji from the shinkansen on the way to Osaka.
Kenmoto-san dancing on the coping of the TRIAL bowl, Osaka.
Trial bowl skate session crew. My legs went to jelly embarrassingly quickly.
All the skaters roll in these in Osaka.
It was my first time in Osaka, and luckily we had Aki to show us around. He took us to eat at his favourite kasu udon restaurant, KASUYA, a tiny place by the side of the road. By far the best udon I've ever eaten, with pieces of deep-fried beef leftover stomach-type parts. Cheap, huge and really good.
Get your pinchers up. With Aki in Osaka.
On the way back to Yamagata, we went via Matsumoto, to catch up with friends Mark and Mika. Matsumoto was a really nice place, not unlike Yamagata, and we enjoyed hanging out with those guys, who did a great job of showing us around their new home town.
Matsumoto Castle, Nagano.
A nice place to enjoy some sunshine. Sorry for cutting half your face off Marku.
Nice view of Hakuba's ranges. Still a lot of snow in May.
There are a few hundred more photos, so if I stay unemployed you might see some of them soon.
