A friend sent me this, this guy is sick......

Inspired. Danny MacAskill from dave on Vimeo.

What do you do when it is a miserable day outside,,,,,,,, MOVIE TIME with your best friend!!!!! So we rented a chick flick P.S. I Love You and I cried about 5 times but it was a great movie. Love Hilary Swank! Then, later in the evening we had James over for dinner and the four of us pigged out on burrito’s!!! MMMMmmmm good. A great chill out day it was.

Can’t wait for the real warm weather, keeps teasing us it seems. Oh well Randall’s POKER RALLY is tomorrow and it’s looking good!!! Team Two Queens and a Joker, Ya-Chan, James and myself will try to round up the prize money!!! Gotta compete against teams like Albert and Mark, Kouji and Michiyo.... arrggggg should be great fun.........Hope to see you there!!


Hanging out in the red room sipping some of James margarita’s!!!

So this is what the white sign looks like from a distance, we used to be able to see it from our window at the old Matsumoto house....

and this is what it looks like up close. It took me an hour to ride up today, a bit longer than usual but nevertheless it felt great and then I could look out at this view......
It was a great day and a good training ride. Sometimes I am lucky enough to get a long enough break from work to hop on my bike and get a ride and onsen in....before the next class. Lucky me....

THE WATANABE CHERRY TREE!!!! We have our very own tree in the backyard. Tried to have a hanami party this weekend but the weather was crazy.....so we moved it indoors, thanks to all who came out!! Happy Hamami!!!

Here is the start of the course where the KING OF DIRT will be decided. The canyon jump is where we will have the best jumpers show their stuff!! My goal is to be able to make it over it by the end of the summer, lol!!!!

Kouji keeps a watchful eye over Hasegawa San’s tractor skills........

It’s looking good!!

Full view from above, as you can see its going to be a great playground!!!

the first berm.....

Kouji hard at work, now the fine tuning and raking begin!!! Volunteers needed!!!!!

Spring in Hakuba, it’s finally here!!!! No more snow please......enjoy some of the sites around our new home......

Saturday, Albert and I head out for a quick ride to Minekata. Excellent day, felt like summer. When I got home, I ended up staying out and fixing up the garden, took all afternoon until sunset. Now to get the bedding plants and put them in. That will have to be next weekend’s plan.
Speaking of next weekend, we are planning to help Randall get ready for the Poker Rally on Saturday. If anyone else is interested in helping us out, please contact me!! We need all the hands we can get. Then on Sunday, we will have a Hamami Ride!!! Sweet Riders home base in Hakuba has it’s very own cherry tree so come out for a ride at 10am then let’s Hanami after the ride!!

We stopped by 47 to catch Kouji working on the stunts and we checked out his new jump bike!! Pretty sweet.... can’t wait to try it out on the jump course he is making at the moment..... will keep you posted!!!

Albert and Anna at our picnic in the middle of our Aoni ride. Climbed to the rice paddies, then took a great picnic break and head out for the killer climb!! Fantastic ride, fantastic day..... then back to the computer....

The view from Aoni, stunning! I am lucky to be able to sneak out in the mornings for a ride and then become the computer slave that I am in the afternoons. Behind schedule for the most part but will get there soon enough!!! Hope you are enjoying the spring!!

Here are the great group of teachers I was honored to join in with down in Miyazaki Ken, Nobeoka City. This was my second time joining Intec Japan for the 3 day intensive seminar at Asahi Kasei Company. It was even better than last year and the students were amazing. I was truly impressed again by the magic that happened during those three days!!! Thanks to all of those who made this possible!! Great work everyone!!

Samm travelled all the way from London to help her cousin Gaz out for this job. Great fun girl, have a safe journey back home........

View more photos of the weekend here!!! Enjoy!!!!

Here is my girlfriend Naoko striking a pose at 47 ski hill. It was a great surprise visit. We just happened to be on Facebook and started chatting and she asked what I was doing that day and the next. I asked “Why, you coming to visit me?” and she replied, “Yes!”. So then in the next hour she was on the bus, and within 4 hours we were picking her up at Hakuba Station. We haven’t seen each other for quite some time so it was great to catch up, introduce her to the locals, the local pubs, party and ski Hakuba style. Good times girl!! It was a great visit!!


As you can see we had a killer blue bird day for some spring skiing. Now I am off to Tokyo and Nobeyoka for the next few days for an intensive English workshop. Mmmm, hopefully down in Kyushyu it will be real spring weather!!!!! Have a great week!!!

Insane video by Leafcycles, wish we had pump tracks like these in Japan!!!!

Leafcycles - a trip to atown from Crowny-Entertainment on Vimeo.

Once again it is time for the Ikeda Poker Rally, don’t miss this one, it’s a great event with great prizes!!!! Sweet Riders will be there competing for the big money!!!! Register now....at raninjapan@yahoo.com!!!
Click on the pdf link below to see the enlarged pdf file!!
Poker ENGVer-1

Thank you to all who came out to our Sweet Riders Bike and Gear Swap!! Thanks to you, our profits were enough to buy new signs, this is the sample picture of our new signs.....will let you know what the real thing looks like soon!!!!

Takeo, Randall, Pepper and I on our ride on Randall’s new trail for the upcoming POKER RALLY!!! It is going to be super sweet when it’s finished!!!! Great day, great ride, great friends!!!!
More pictures here.....