I am.. Peter MacWhinnie.

Today was a down day. We didn’t go anywhere incredibly exciting, just did a few things around town and had dinner with Steven’s co-workers.

The day started like any other. We all woke up at about the same time. I took a shower. However! We had something different for breakfast. We had (drumroll) french toast. It was good, and reminded me of the fact that that’s pretty much what I eat for breakfast everyday under normal circumstances.

After breakfast we spent some time at the apartment and caught up with some things. Steven and mum went through pictures, I wrote my travelog entry for yesterday. It was nice to take a break.

We left the apartment for a little while around 11:30. The view of the surrounding mountains was completely clear today, so we went back to apple hill. While there we bought some food for the plane ride home and we walked back up the hill to the tower. The view was beautiful, and on the way up I tried an odd Japanese canned drink. The container looked like it should have held white-gas or propane, and the contents were like really good cream soda. I don’t remember the name of it, unfortunately. It was something like Ambada or Ambasa, I really can’t remember. After we came down from the tower, we got some apple ice cream.

We then went to lunch. The place was local, in Namioka. The restaurant was run by an interior decoration company, and the food was quite good. Me and Steven had curry (two different types) and mum had spaghetti. It was quite good.

After lunch we went to the electronics store where we got batteries for my camera. Then we went back to the 100 yen store where I bought a few more gifts for people back home.

We came back to the apartment where Steven and mum had a quick nap and I downloaded pictures from my camera. After Steven finished with his nap we (me and him) went for a bike ride in town. He got a few pictures printed out of him and Mio, [for him and Mio]. During the bike ride we went along the side of the river (its not really much of a river, its blocked off to prevent flooding) and went back to the Namioka temple. After going through the park we went to the food market where I got some peach Calpis. We then headed back to the picture place, picked up the prints, and came back to the apartment.

We then had about an hour of nothing at all. After which we headed over to dinner. We had dinner at a local restaurant with Steven’s co-workers. It was an Izakaya. The food was delicious and I had more Calpis (as well as a [few] dry cocktail). Steven’s co-workers were/are very nice, and it was quite fun. They kept giving me more and more food, all of which was delicious, so it was hard to say no.

I did not realize until we left that there were people smoking in the Izakaya, so when we arrived back I realized that I smelled quite terrible. So I just had a quick shower and started getting stuff together for this weekend.

We’re going to Hokkaidō for the Onsen this weekend, so I won’t be near my computer tomorrow. As such, there won’t be a post tomorrow. I will write what will be my final entry while still in Japan on sunday night (local time). I’ll write one or two more entries here before writing my final essay to complete the study unit. I won’t be posting any more pictures until sunday. So. Goodnight.