It’s so cold up here in the north-west that the chill immediately goes through your jeans and your nose wants to drop off. It’s a stunning part of the world and just up the road is where the Winter Olympics were held in 1998.

Today kicked off at 9 am taking the bullet train from Himeji. When you take the bullet train you always have a waiting area directly under the tracks where you can relax if you wish. We got to the station early and I went to get a couple coffees from the shop in the waiting area. A bullet train went flying overhead and the whole joint rattled so hard the lovely old lady serving me nearly dropped the cup. It reminded me of the Blues Brothers when Jake gets out of prison and taken back to Elroy’s apartment which is 3 feet from the train line! (Jake-“How often’s the train go by?”. Elroy- So often you won’t even notice it.”)

Shortly after we headed up to the platform. We’ve seen the bullet train arrive and have taken photos like the one below, but we were totally unprepared to have one whizz by at maximum velocity. I remember saying to Lynda something like, “Hey it’s a…” when suddenly this white flash and a huge gust of wind scared the bejeezus out of us! They truly are amazing.

So today was a big train day. The plan being that we wanted a day of relaxing and sightseeing into the Japanese Alps. The bullet train took us to Nagoya then it was a 30 min wait to get on a regular train run by Japan Rail, so it’s covered by the JR Pass. Himeji to Nagoya was about 20 mins, then Nagoya to Nagano was about 3 hours.

Apologies for the photos tonight. Unfortunately, a lot were taken from the train and not that good. The landscape starts to change dramatically about 45 mins into the journey and within another hour it started snowing! Always exciting as a WA boy to see snow. My favourite part today was the mountains filled with pines and covered with a dusting of snow. It looked like icing sugar.

This shot is of a classic Japanese “Salaryman” with snow falling outside the window. This group of Salarymen all passed out asleep with 3 minutes of getting on the train! The Japanese only wear black and navy blue suits so my boss Drew would be outcast due to his penchant for outlandish shirts and suits.

So we get to Nagano and we are told our hotel is another 20 mins on the bullet train east! Fortunately, you never have to wait long so we were soon on our way. Below is the only photo I got of Nagano from the train station!

Some more sensational scenery on the way to Karuizawa and we finally landed. It’s about -3 degrees and sunny upon arrival! We are going to harden up and go for a 2-hour walk on a local track tomorrow after sitting on trains all day. This town is very quaint and looks like an alpine village similar to a Bright. That’s on one side of the railway line. On the other side you have a ski resort on a mountain obviously but as we discovered tonight whilst looking for a feed, there is a massive lake and surrounding that lake, the biggest factory outlet for designer brands we have ever seen. All the NYC, London and Paris brands were there as well as all the sporting icons but on a massive scale. It was bizarre but not garish like a lot of places that have factory outlets.

View from the hotel room. The other photos are in the dark of the outlet place. Terrible photos but the lake had an island in the middle and was lit up with all sorts of stuff.

Hope a cool change got through today for everyone back home. It’s -6 degrees tonight and 4 degrees tomorrow! Thanks to those who have sent back feedback on the journal it’s much appreciated. Last day tomorrow as we head back to Tokyo. The plan is to have one crack at getting wedding rings for fat westerners and head back to the shoebox restaurant in Ginza and surprise the owner with one last visit! Selfishly I just want to taste that ramen one last time and finally commit it to memory! Goodnight and Cheers Willow & Lynda.