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Published: March 4th 2012
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Finally made it to Japan, after what felt like an never ending journey that started at 3:30am in Melbourne finished 03:00am in Nozawa-Onsen Japan!!!
After driving through the still constant rain that Melbourne has been having and saying the goodbyes to Mum while she tried to hold the tears back I was kicking back in Qantas Club smashing some raisin toast.. Kinda felt like I was head back to work... The flight to Cairns was OK, slept most of it except maybe the last hour when your at that stage of trying to find a comfy stop but it's just not happening.. Landed in Cairns, collected my bags and walked off to the international Terminal. This was the first taste of Japan I got!! I recon there was roughly 6 Aussie is total on the plane.... Once checked in, bag tagged and gone, whizzed through passport check, I was chilling at the bar having a feed and waiting for 10am so I can have my first beer :-) Said my goodbyes on the old FB and then I was on the plane at 1pm.
Ended up sitting next to a Kiwi by the name of
Guy, pretty cool bloke. We had a few cans of CC and talked about mining etc. His working in Gladestone on the Bektel project as a digger operator, good coin... He said it's still next to impossible to find a accom up there... May not too late to buy a house or land up around there.
After running my phone and laptop flat from watching movies with a couple of sleeps in between I was just starting to get to that stage I just wanted to get off that plane!! We started coming into Tokyo, to land spot on time 6:45pm. As we got off the plane Guy and I were both in the same boat having a fingers crossed someone on the other side of the doors will have a sign with our names on it..
Got my bags, wished Guy a good trip and I walked out to see a mob of people holding signs with names of them but not one with mine!!! I was checking out the bench seats to find the comfiest for the night when I saw one guy hold a sign with the name of the company
I booked with, Chuo Taxi... I approached him and asked a few questions, after what felt like a while of zero English and pointing he clicked on and called another guy that was about 5m away with another sign with "Sain" written on it. I looked at the sign said Nozawa-Onsen which he nodded and I replied with "That's good enough mate let's go".
Taxi driver told me he had 6 other passengers to take and It'll be roughly 5-6 hours drive!! Not bad for only $140 AUS. Once we picked everyone up and was on our way it felt like we had got on a never ending spaghetti bowl of freeways, they just come and go everywhere!! One of the Japanese in the shuttle bus was an older man with his wife and daughter that could speak a little bit of English. We laughed and tried to teach his daughter some English but she was the typical shy Japanese girl.
The bus stopped for a food and toilet break and the family took me under their wing showing me how to order food and more importantly what it was!! It was really strange,
there was no counter to order but a wall full of pictures with number next to them and then 3 vending like machines with number on them. Once picking what meal you'd like from the pictures, you put your money in the vending machine, press the corresponding number which the machine replies with spitting out a ticket. From here you walk to the kitchen, give them the ticket and they go off and whip it up for you. Easy as that..
Topped up with chicken and rice it was time to head back to the bus. At this stage I think it was 10pm and I was knacked, passing out nearly before we left the car park. Waking a couple of times when we stopped to let the other off, I said my goodbyes to the lovely family that looked after me. Then it was just the driver and I to go find my accom for the night, by this time it was 2am with another hour of driving to go!!
Waking up once again I could see snow cover housed out the window and I knew I was getting close.. With stopping a
couple of times to check the map, we finally found it. Grabbing my bag, I said my goodbyes to the driver and I enter the ever so quite Lodge Nagano. Shoes off and sleepers on i charged my electrical gadgets and had a little snoop. I said here last time I was in Japan so I already new where everything was. Not even 5mins later I heard 2 drunk guys rock up falling over themselves, haha was pretty funny. I said my Hello's and managed to get the WIFI password out of them before they pasted out on the common room couch.
With a quick jump of FB to tell the world I was ok, it was finally time for bed!!!
Ohh and by the way, yes it is FREAKING COLD!!!
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Mum
non-member comment
well done
Thouroughly enjoyed reading your entry. Pleased everything went smoothly for you. I have saved this site to favourites so I can follow you around the world. Have fun. Love you heaps,Mum