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Today was huge. The morning was totally epic. It was up there with the best snow I have ever ridden.

The snow puked down all night last night, giving us around 20cm down here in the village, and a good 40+cm up the top. Fantastic.

I woke fairly early this morning as I was having this dream where I was really really thirsty, but no matter how much water I drank, it was never enough. So I woke up and found that my tongue was like a piece of leather in my mouth. It was extremely dry. I got up and walked out to the tap to get some water. I had a look out the window and I saw snow. Lots of snow. The cars in the car park had a nice thick coating on the top. I started to get excited. My mouth went dry. I had to get some more water.

I came back to the room and Tony got up and we headed down for breakfast. I ate some of these ball things. I call them mystery balls because they are filled with this strange goo that sort of explodes through your mouth when you bite into them. It's some sort of cheese I think. I'm not completely sold on them. I keep trying though.

After breakfast was done Tony and I got ready to hit the mountain. We had everything prepared and caught the bus to the gondola. The bus fishtailed into the corner where our stop is. Another group of guys left behind one of their number. There's no friends on a powder day. At the gondola the line wasn't too big and we were heading up by 8:40. The snow was still puking down. You could see out the window that it was very deep.

Once at the top Tony and I strapped ourselves in and then threw ourselves down the mountain. It was magic. The snow was so deep, but still very light that you could just punch through the turns. Fantastic. Everyone up there was having a blast. Unless you got caught in a flat and needed to dig yourself out. Even then it was fun.

The winds were too high to open up the top of the mountain but Tony and I had more than enough fun down the bottom of the hill. We managed to avoid most of the big lines more by luck than by any planning. We were lucky enough to be amongst the first to be up the Ace Pair Lift. The run down there was unbelievable. The first 3/4 of it was some of the best riding of my life. Just perfect. Right under the lifts and straight down. Powerful turns. Smooth soft snow. Amazing. I was hooting and hollering the whole way down. Until I hit the flat. Then I needed to dig myself out and hike out. The snow was as deep as my waste.

In the afternoon Tony and I had a bit of a break. I snoozed, Tony put some videos and pictures up on his MySpace page. You should check it out.

At around 5:30 we got up again and it was time to hit the mountain again. It was good. Not as good as this morning, but still a lot of fun. It was pretty cold tonight, so we took the gondola up most times. There was still a bit of powder around through the trees. There was an old Japanese guy who was synchronised with us. He went up with us, then he went down with us. He didn't speak English but we were able to work out that he is 70. He was wearing a bell, which was a bit annoying, but a cool guy all round. Still spritely.

Tonight we dined at the 100 yen Noodle Shop again. It was good. There were only gaijin in there though. I guess that's who their main market is. Tomorrow Tony and I are going cat-skiing. It should be sweet. I'm looking forward to it. Hopefully it will snow a little bit more tonight so we can have fresh lines all day tomorrow.