Happo-One Powder

Today we ventured to the closest resort to our lodge, called Happo-One, and found ourselves on our skis by 8am with the Craig family! Note that the One in Happo-One is not a 1, it is o-ne, meaning ridge in Japanese. This resort has heap of lifts distributed around the bottom of the hill, which all converge to the same point at the top. And it was the site of the downhill ski racing from the 1998 Nagano Winter Olympics. And it has some stunning views.

I've heard people rave about powder but never experienced it...until today! WOW...I totally get it now! It's so light and beautiful. A favourite run of ours today was down a windy road where we veered up on to the uphill side and into the powder. There were a few stacks, lots of laughs and heaps of fun!

It was a two stop day, hot chocolate and bakery delights at 10am and according to Ella and Jules, the best doughnuts ever! Then lunch at 1pm...where the girls all enjoyed having Dippin Dots...a Japanese ice cream speciality or the Ice Cream of the future - where the ice cream comes out in tiny balls, as seen in the photos below!

Post lunch, the majority of the group opted to explore an area known as Skyline which although was a green run, it required skiing a rather tough run to get there so Katy and I decided to make a snowman and have a snow ball fight instead. As we regrouped, it was decided to make a mad dash for the bus (ran every hour). For me, that was always going to be a challenge.....11mins to descend the 2.5km blue run. As Andy and I skied into the bottom of the run we watched the bus pull away with Jules, Paul and all the girls onboard. We began trudging in our uncomfortable snow boots the kilometre or so back to the lodge only to see a friendly face pull up - Paul has commandeered the lodge car and returned to pick us up. We gratefully climbed in.

A soak in the lodge's onsen was a wonderful way followed by a Surasa's beautiful sukiyaki dinner to complete the day.