Trip to Japan!

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So, the travel blog tells me I haven't written on here for about 120 days so I thought it was time for a little update.
This past January Brendan and I and our buddies Greg and Jimmy took a backpacking trip to Japan. We were there for about 2 weeks, travelling to Tokyo, then Nagano and then back to Tokyo.
It was a pretty cool trip with good company! We flew into Tokyo and stayed there for a few days taking in the sights, fashion and food. We stayed in a Hostel because Tokyo is so expensive there was no way way we could afford a Hotel. We slept in some bunkbeds that were clean and comfortable, so all were happy. Absolutely LOVE the fashion in Tokyo. I was so envious of all the girls passing by in their stylish clothes while I walked around looking like a bum in my limited backpacker clothes.
Greg with his amazing movie making talent created a awesome music video while in Tokyo.
Check it out on youtube.com

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After a few days in Tokyo we took the bullet train to Nagano, where they had the 1998 Winter Olympics. We bought our tickets the day before and therefore the day we were to catch the train to nagano we misjudged the time we'd spend on the subway getting to the train station. We had to BOOT it or we'd all loose out on $80.00 a piece for this train ticket we had. So picture 4 foreigners all with big backpacks on their backs racing through subway stations, climbing masses amount of stairs, sweating perfusely. The subway stations are very large in Tokyo and we had a few transfers so there was a lot of running to be done. When we finally reached the train station.. (which was a little confusing to get to) we all ran one behind the other and some how with the masses amount a people when we got to the train and turned around... brendan was missing!!! At this point the train is trying to close the doors on us. I had to race back down this huge flight of stairs and spotted him across the hall. I screamed and waved, and Brendan ran his ass up the stairs and we made the train by seconds... seriously! It totally felt like we were on the "Amazing Race"!

In Nagano we had a cabin rented for 4 nights. It was such a nice cabin with everything you would need inside. The owner of the cabin's son pick us up at the station and took us to the grocery store so we could buy our groceries for the next 4 days, then headed to the cabin for some rest. The following 3 days we hit the slopes. Biggest mountains I've ever skied on! So, beautiful with fluffy fresh snow.
On the third day Greg had a little accident and had to use his traveller's insurance. Long story short, the edge of Jimmy's snowboard collided into greg's shin. So the 4th day Jimmy, Bren and I went to the hot springs which was HEAVEN and removed all soreness from the previous 3 days of skiing all day.

We left back to Tokyo on the 5th day of being in NAgano. Found a new Hostel, and I left the guys for the evening because I had an appointment in Shabuya to get a new tattoo.. It took way longer then expected so i had to go back the next afternoon to finish it. The design was beautiful, but the tattoo artist's work was not so great... I ended up getting Barry from Planet Ink

http://www.planetinkottawa.com/

in Ottawa, Canada to fix the WHOLE thing... and now I love it. Advice, shop around A LOT before getting a tattoo when in a foreign country😊

The last few day sin Tokyo we went to Harajuku Station on the hunt for some Harajuku girls... we did find some but not many. It snowed so much the last day we were there so it was difficult to take pictures.
All in all it was a great trip, Japan is a great country and I would definitely consider teaching English there if it wasn't so expensive.

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Photos

The Gang
In front of the Mountain we skied on but can't see it cause it's snowing so much:)

Drummer
In the park by Harajuku Station

Wrapped
In Harajuku shopping area

Comments

[Mom]

One more country "down".....many more to go...
Great to hear all about Japan in print.....now you need to do a blog on your trip back home to Canada for all the world travelers out there!! Come visit Canada!!! Miss you!!