Monday March through the Marshes. Or sludge as the case may be.

What a day. As far as last days on the snow go, it was pretty good.
We started out the day with the prerequisite waking, breakfast, morning snowboard dressing ritual, and then busted it out to the slopes.

After missing a large part of Yesterday travelling to the reaches of the unknown (Yokoteyama) we headed straight up the first lift at Ichinose and took the flat run down the back to Terakoya. I was still getting my legs (and my confidence) back after the whole pelvic injury thing that transpired, so I took the first run fairly calmly. After going up the main middle lift at Terakoya we stopped for a quick photo, and then started off down the middle run. I should mention that with temperatures rising at the moment in Shiga Kogen, Terakoya seemed like a good start to the day, as the sun has to rise over the mountain before it starts to affect the snow, as opposed to some areas that suffer direct sunlight from morning till night.

The first run I was trying to get my legs still, but even so Steven and I had time to skip a line through the trees. As this seemed like fun we started trying to spot lines through the trees we could take the second time. But as is obvious nothing goes to plan. Once we set off the top of the mountain any attempts to take a bee-line through the trees was thwarted by the dreaded SKI PATROL (ominous music, "Doom doom DOOooooooooom"). A few boarders who had set off just before me were being told to get out of the out of bounds sections, and me, being the agreeable citizen like I am (Halo appears above head!) decided that it was best to let sleeping dogs lie. So after passing the Ski Patrol, I told Conrad (the Extreme!(TM)) that I wasn't going to attempt the tree adventure, and instead just shot down as fast as I could to the bottom, which I have to admit felt fairly quick. It was nice to be getting my confidence back.

After we reached the bottom (and Steven bragged about taking a trip through the trees regardless of the Patrol, ominous music) we set up the same lift a 3rd time, but with a different course in mind. We shot down towards the far left lift in order to take it up to the back of Higashitateyama. When we spotted that there was a path below the lift we were on we changed plans slightly to see how this path worked. It was a short diversion, and after reaching the bottom and making it back up the lift we headed towards the bottom of Ichinose and over to Yakebitai.

After a few different paths we made our way to the Terrain Park (Jumps and Grinds area) because I had a hankering to try a jump or 2. I still was trying to protect my poor gut, but I didn't want to miss a chance at trying a jump, seeing as I never had the skill/guts to do it before (ha ha ha, Guts, and my guts is hurting). So I led the way, after waiting for Conrad to get into Photographer Extraordinaire Position! and made my way to the first grind box. Nothing special, just rode along it and off, but I landed, and that was a BIG DEAL. I'm sure Steven can tell you how he thinks he went, so i'll stick to how I did for the most part.

I crashed. Alot. But I still had fun, and for someone who has never done jumps before, or even been taught, I feel like it was a good start. Plus I didn't want to wreck my board, seeing as it isn't a park board, and it's still new (and my BABY!). I made a few little jumps, and I laughed (I couldn't help it) when Steven fell over on the grind box straight onto his bum, all you could hear was BOOOM, and seem him sort of bounce a little. Yep, he bounced. Laughs. After 2 runs down we had to call it quits (we had a quick snack of chips/sweet buns after the first run) as we were hungry and we had to head back to Ichinose area for food, as Prince Hotel (North, South, East, West, whatever) are all expensive, and the food's not that great. So after taking the large 8 seater Gondola to the top of Yakebitai it was a stonking fast run to the bottom for me. I went faster then I've gone for a long time, and it showed by how long I had to wait at the bottom for the other 2.

After a diversion (the lifts down the bottom of Yakebitai towards Ichinose were closed) we made it over and sat down at Rocky's to have a beer, Coffee, and Food. By now it was 3 and we knew that once we got up we would only have maybe 1 or 2 runs at best before it was time to call it quits. So we agreed upon taking the Ichinose lift to Terakoya, taking the top run along to Higashitate, and then looping back again to Ichinose. So once we reached the top of Terakoya Conrad and I got out our Video Cameras and started taping some runs. So I've got video of the loop run, if you want to see it, however it's a little jumpy, as you can imagine.

Well long story short, we made it back to the bottom or Ichinose and the lifts were only JUST running, so Steven and I broke away from Conrad to take 1 last run. And it felt good. Taking a trail through the trees and making it back to the bottom, we said goodbye to Shiga Kogen and it's beautiful snow, hopefully not for the last time, and slunk our way back to the hotel.

As we had eaten everywhere else except the hotel for the past week or so, our front desk clerk Ganji was urging us to have food with them, so us being the obliging sort, obliged. Or oblodged...? It was a fairly mild affair, thought surprisingly tasty with Chicken, Beef strips (we cooked ourselves, and they were really nicely marbled) and various vegetables. We called it a night after some packing and had our last little slumber in Snowy heaven....thingamajig.

Snow is cold. But Cold is Cool. So snowmen are Cool-men.
I miss the boarding already.