Girls' Day Out in Tokyo

Today I spent the day with some wonderful friends in Tokyo. We dropped the kids off at school and headed to the train station straight for Tokyo. We had plans to go to Rainbow Roll Sushi restaurant. What an awesome restaurant this was. I can't wait till I can bring Chad here. The sushi was unbelievable, great ambiance, and terrific conversation with friends.

After our leisurely lunch we took a taxi over to Midtown to do some shopping. This is a really shwanky shopping complex with restaurants and the Ritz Carlton attached. What an amazing day out we had!

Shiga Kogen, Nagano

After our stop at the Snow Monkey Park we headed on up the mountain to the Shiga Kogon area of Nagano. Many of the Olympic venues were in this area of Nagano. We stayed at Villa Alpen, a ski in/ski out hotel that ended up being more like staying with good friends. The "Captain" as he is known to folks who have repeatedly stayed here was extremely hospitable. His hotel was so kid friendly and well fun. It is a tradional hotel with tatami mats, futons, and an onsen (hot Japanese bath).

We arrived a little after 4:00 and brought our luggage up with the help of Ken-san via sleds. There is a big parking lot about 200 yards from the hotel. No cars are allowed in the little "village" which makes it safe to sled and ski right up to the lifts.

Dinner every night was at 6:00 and we ate with all the other guests staying in the hotel. The food was amazing traditional Japanese food. There was such attention to detail with the meal. Lauren, Chad and I adored it. Allie stuck to the meat and sticky rice.


Chad took a snowboarding lesson and the girls took skiing lessons from the Captain's son, Ken-san. He was awesome and they loved him. He was so patient and gentle with them. The really got their confidence up and was making it down the hill in no time.


Chad did great also...much better than his self taught attempt at snowboarding a few weeks back. He got up, found his balance and made it down a pretty aggressive run. I think he will be shredding up the mountain the next time we go.

The girls took a break from skiing and spent some time sledding down the hill right outside of the hotel. It was so easy and convienant.


The only thing we had to watch out for was this really cool van with triangle tires. It was from the hotel right next to us bring people and luggage up from the parking lot.

The bar at the hotel served pancakes all day and had a big TV with lots of movies for the kids to watch. There were huge windows overlooking the lifts and sledding area.

There was also a fireplace and on the last night the Captain brought out marshmallows for the girls to roast. They were in heaven.

We had a wonderful weekend and can't wait to get back up there. Hopefully we will make one more trip this winter.

Jigokudani (Snow Monkey Park) Nagano, Japan

This weekend we headed to Nagano for a little rest, relaxation, fun and skiing...well maybe scratch the rest and relaxation, but keep the skiing and fun. Nagano is about a 5 hour beautiful drive from the base. We left on Friday morning and on our way up there we stopped at Jigokudani which is the park that has these amazing snow monkeys roaming around and soaking in the natural hot springs. It is about a 30 minute hike to get to the park. With lots of cheering Allie on we made it in about 45 minutes.

And of course (see sign below), "Because there is a situation when a step is bad...please be careful".



You walk into the park and then there they are...hundred of monkeys walking around. This is not a zoo, but just an open area were they live and lots of people come to see them. We were told not to make eye contact and not to bring food. The first thing we saw was one of the monkeys take someone's bag down the hill while they were photographing. It was pretty funny.


How relaxing does that look???

Shin's Sushi

Chad and I and three other couples went out for the most incredible sushi. Shin, the owner of the sushi restaurant and sushi master himself took very good care of us that night. The restaurant is very small and maybe would seat 16 people total. He prepared all the sushi right in front of us and kept the sake and bieru (beer) flowing for us. It was a one man show. The picture of me above is when I tried whale for the first time. Very yummy! We had giant raw scallops, kobe beef, salmon, tuna, squid and much, much more. Everything was so impeccably fresh without the slightest fishy taste. It was a great night out with wonderful friends!

Here is Shin-san...the "Sushi Master"

Here was the gang...Chad,me, Sybil, Bob, Betsy, Pat, Brian and Tracy!

Big Air Wing Party

Six Skippers got together to throw one big Change of Command Party. The word on the street wast that they each contributed $2,000 each to throw the party. It was at the O'Club and the whole air wing was invited. Each squadron had skits that they did and then we played beer games. Chad and I made a very competitive husband/wife team.

Here is am playing "beer pong". The object of the game is to bounce a ping pong ball into the red cups across the table. I would either sink it in the cup or miss the table completely.

Am I 83 or 33...I was pretty darn good at shuffleboard. Chad and I made it to the finals.

Here are two of the funniest guys in from one of the skits.

Hail and Farewell at the Gyoza House

Our Det Hail and Bail on Tuesday was at the Gyoza House. They serve some of the best Gyoza around. We sat on the tatami mats Japanese style which can get a little uncomfortable for us Westerners.

Skiing and Sledding in Yeti

On Sunday we took a MWR tour to Yeti Snow Town, a small ski resort near Mt Fuji. It only took us a couple of hours to get there. It was a great day...the sun was shining and it wasn't even freezing. All the snow there was man-made. The girls took off first to the sledding section of the area. We went with our friends Jennie and John and their little girl Rylie. They all had a blast going down the hill. Everyone got going really fast. It was a little slick in spots and most of us adults hit the ground as we tried to walk around.

All of us rented skis and we had a go at skiing. Lauren was very cautious and hung onto our arm most of the way down the bunny slope. Allie on the other hand went down without poles and without fear. She was awesome!

This was Chad's first attempt at snowboarding. He was able to stand up and shimmy down the hills with only about 50 or so falls on the way down. I think he may be signing up for lessons when we go to Nagano.






We had lunch in their little noodle shop there at the resort. That sure did warm us up. As we were about to leave this was the magnificent view of Fuji behind us. We had such a fun time on our first Japanese ski adventure.

Harajuku

After checking out of our hotel we trained over to Harajuku, a very trendy young eclectic area in Tokyo. We had heard of a great place for lunch called Fujimamas. Along the walk from the train station to the restaurant there were many little food tents set up along the street selling all sorts of street food. We passed them up on the way to the restaurant, but couldn't resist on the walk back. Chad just had to stop for this grilled squid (ika) brushed with a thick soy sauce.
I had a bite and the flavor was great, the texture was a little chewy.

We were also able to stop at a children's store called Kiddiland. This store was 6 stories tall and had quite an assortment of toys. Right beside the 30,000 yen barbies (over $300.00) there was a great Chucky doll. Remember the movie?

Tokyo Tower and Shopping

The girls, Chad and I went to Tokyo for the night and stayed at the New Sanno Hotel. We did a little sightseeing before we checked in. We had not been to the Tokyo Tower and it was a clear beautiful day to see all of Tokyo. Well we got there and the line was just a little bit long I think the rest of Japan had the same idea. The girls were happy to take a picture with some pink thing (see below) and play in the park next door.


He must be a mascot for the tower or something. They both really wanted their picture with him though.

Right beside the long line (see below for a visual) was this lady doing some sort of act with a monkey. He was pretty cute and really captured our attention.


We finished up at the Tower and Chad took the girls back to the hotel to go swimming while I went out and did a little window shopping. There is a huge department store called Isetan in the Shinjuku area of Tokyo. Typically in Japanese department stores on the first basement level (B1) will be a food hall. There are tons of food vendors, patisseries, bakeriers and usually a nice grocery store. This is one of the nicest food halls I have seen. There were two really famous pastry chefs that I was going to check out. It did not disappoint!

Jan 2nd is the start of a major sale season in Japan. The Isetan was mobbed and they actually had employees directing the flow of traffic. I have never seen anything like it. I just kept thinking to myself how smart it was of us to send Chad to the hotel with the girls.

After I was done shopping I trained back to the hotel and got ready for our romantic dinner out. We had a babysitter, Naomi, come and watch the girls. The loved her.



Here we are ready to check out and do a little more exploring before heading home.