Aormori Aquarium

We made a day trip to Aormori Aquarium which is about 2 hours north of us. This Aquarium was different from other aquariums being unique to Japan.




Dylan exploring the different sea creatures.

Lindsey swimming with the Seals

Lindsey Ballet

Lindsey started ballet lessons every Monday here on base. She loves it!!!

Christmas & New Year's

Santa made his way to Japan

Dylan & Lindsey opening their presents at zero dark thirty.

Grace's extended family on New Year's

Grace & I on New Year's

Hakoda Mt. Hike

Drinking SAKI with the local Japanese hikers!!! They stayed up there 2 days to celebrate the New Year's. They were very friendly even though they did not speak much English. These hikers are the ones who maintain the cabin and trails and made things comfortable for us. Definetly made some new friends and the universal language was alcohol.

It was cold when we stopped!

Ramen Noodles for Dinner.

My neighbor Eric and I went on a hike up in the Hokoda Mountains. We stayed the night in the cabin with some local Japanese hikers. The journey to the cabin was an extreme workout but it was all worth it. There were times where it got a little scary and if we hadn't done any research before the hike we would have been in trouble.

The snow was 30+ feet in some areas. This is Eric standing next to 50ft pine trees covered by snow. Visibility was bad and we were lucky we left early in the morning because another foot had fallen over night which made it hard to snow shoe in. The storm continued all day and we left before we got snowed in.

This is the ravine we came up to get to the cabin. Visibility was good but when we left the next day visibility was zero and the wind had picked up. We thought it was going to be easy going back because we would be climbing down the mountain. We were wrong.