Shika Deer

Koby has a short day at school today, I think the school is gearing up for the Japanese Holiday called "Golden Week" where everyone is off for a week. We have a lot of plans, including 2 picnics, a shopping trip, and some park stops for the kids. We are also going to try and find a new terminal adapter so we can finally get Internet access.

My friend snowman invited me to go on a trip with him one day, but I refused, since Yasuko and the kids would be stuck at home by themselves. Hopefully I will be able to go with him on Summer Vacation. Also next week the village we live in will be selling vegetables to the tourists that travel the road through our town on the way to visit the Asahidake mountains. I will be helping out packing vegetables.

After breakfast, I got the clean clothes folded and put away, and straightened up the house a bit, I bought a 20 liter water container yesterday at the store, and cleaned it out real good, now we have a larger container to collect spring water in.

The cherry blossoms are looking beautiful, and I am going to get some more pictures today, I will try and take pictures everyday to show the change in them, I cannot miss this opportunity since they bloom so quickly and then fall off. In Tokyo they have already bloomed and fell off about a month ago, we are late here in Hokkaido because of the higher elevation and cooler weather.

It is very warm today, short sleeve weather, but the wind is really blowing hard, the skies are a little hazy but the sun is out and shining. After Koby got off of school he had homework to finish, and all of the school kids had planned a picnic under the cherry blossom trees. Koby took a 2 liter drink and some snacks, and a blanket to put on the ground.

I decided to go get some spring water in my new 20 liter container I bought. This time the parking lot was not full so I quickly collected my 20 liter container and 4 other 2 liter bottles, after that I decided to drive up Asahidake mountain, it is a breathtaking view and I stopped many times to take pictures. Snow is still deep on the mountain and I saw many skiers and snow boarders still enjoying the deep powder.

It was a hot day in Shibinai today, but on the mountain it was still very cool, it felt great. At the end of the road on the mountain you are over 800 meters above sea level. On the way down I was just looking at the beautiful scenery and say 4 Japanese Shikah Deer grazing on the side of the road, luckily there was a driveway right where they were at and I quickly pulled in. They didn't even run, and looked as if they wanted to come closer, I got some great pictures.

Later that evening we went into Asahikawa to an electronics store and looked around at all of the gadgets, after that we were going to go eat dinner at a Ramen restaurant, but we were too late and they were closed, the kids were unhappy, but we can try again tomorrow. Tomorrow starts Koby's week long vacation.