Playing in the snow

Yesterday morning, I had ambitious thoughts of working out crossed my mind. But the my host fathers word the day before won out: "Don't fight the theme." He had told us that his theme for our two days was him was relaxation. Well okay.

We spent the afternoon snowmobiling. I'm not kidding. All of us, except for Beth, put on about every layer of clothing we have and headed out into the cold. Hiroshi, our host father, supplemented what we lacked. With goggles strappled over brightly colored hoods, we looked like snowmen from the 80s.


Like the Sierra, Japan didn't get much snow this year, so we just went to an open meadow and made a race track of it, looping around in figure eights. I discovered that any proficiency I may have in snowboarding just doesn't translate. I think I was one of the ones the faster members of the group didn't want to get stuck behind. I got braver as time went on, but I still couldn't get my last and only experience of rolling one of those 500 pound machines out of my mind.


My cowardice makes for lame photos, until we staged more dramatic photos, with Erin throwing snow in the air to make it look like I was leaving a snow wake.

Afterwards, we headed back to the condo for hot chocolate and a dip in the hot springs.

Lesson learned: I'll have to stick with our staged photos if I want to look like I have any shred of skill on a snowmobile.