first boarding

Managed to get up at 5 am. Hiroko's sniffles turned into a right and proper cold, so with a fever and runny nose she wasn't going anywhere.
I stumbled about, got my board and gear together, and headed off to Tokyo Station, arriving about 6:30 for our 7am train. Other folks trickled in and then we were on our way. It was a quick 1.5 hours to Eichigo-Yuzawa, short shuttle to the hostel, then off to the slopes. Iwappa is a small mountain, but it had been snowing all night and continued to snow all day, with a break of sunshine at lunch for about 20 minutes.
Needless to say there was nice fresh powder everywhere. The only chunky icy bit was the steep drop leading into the gondola.
I spent the day with the iPod blasting, digging myself out of waist-deep flat powder, winding my way down from the gondola and trying to remember how to board. By the end of the day I had managed to carve a decent line or two, but my thighs and feet were protesting. My boots and bindings were ok, but I had cranked the boots too tightly across my instep.
By 3:30 I took my last run, grabbed my gear from the locker, took one last ride up the gondola, and headed right. I didn't go far right enough, it seems, because I ended up at Ski Center 2, not 1 at the very bottom of the mountain. I changed and walked through the parking lot looking for the bus to the train station, only to find myself walking all the way down the mountain to the bottom. I arrived at Ski Center 1 and grabbed the bus, hit the station, switched my tickets, jumped on the train, and was in Tokyo by 6:30.
When I got home, Hiroko had been in bed all day battling her cold, so I commiserated for a bit and we ate porridge and took a hot bath. I didn't want to complain about my sore legs and arms, seeing as how she had a cold and a fever, but it was fairly obvious considering how much TigerBalm I slathered on after the bath.