We're engaged!

3rd January

Yes, we're engaged! Last night outside the Sapporo Brewery, whilst it was snowing heavily and extremely atmospheric, Mike proposed! It was very special and the perfect location. The ring is beautiful, but we'll have to get it resized once we're back in Brisbane. We're both really happy and super excited! Thanks to everyone who've already offered their congratulations.

He proposed outside this in the snow!

The beautiful ring

Even before the proposal, we'd had a really eventful day and I was originally going to name this post - 'Jacqui and the Chocolate Factory'. In the morning we visited Shiroi Koibito Park, which is Sapporo's famous chocolate factory. It was a really interesting place and had much more than just the factory tour. We also saw a huge Royal Doulton designed fountain, a chocolate cup collection, a gramophone gallery and a massive collection of toys from the twentieth century - a very strange mix of displays!

View from the street

The clock tower which has strange little singing characters come out of it every hour

One of many tree houses

Buildings which are part of the factory

Looking in whilst on the factory tour

Still looking in...

All around the top of the factory are fantastic sculptures of people

Below is some of the toy display:

The best part of the factory tour was the amazing Chocolate Lounge and there we enjoyed some very indulgent chocolate fondue.

Not a bad view from the Chocolate Lounge!

Mmmm what to order...

Chocolate fondue! 

After we were back in the city centre we decided to head up to the Sapporo TV Tower Observation Deck which had been closed the previous day. The tower offered a particularly good view of Odori Park stretching through the city. However once we were up there we did regret not waiting until dark so we could have got a photo of the park lit up with its stunning lights display. It was great to see the layout of the land though, with the mountains and even the sea.

Odori Park is the snowy strip through the middle

After dinner and the excitement of becoming engaged, we bought a bottle of sparkling wine from a convenience store (have I mentioned you can buy alcohol anywhere in this country?) and went back to the hotel.

What the?!

Just in case you didn't know how to use a toilet!

4th January

We woke up extremely early this morning to meet the bus bound for Niseko (Grand Hirafu). After three hours on the bus winding through the very snowy mountains, we finally arrived at the Hirafu Welcome Centre and then a shuttle bus from our lodge came and picked us up from there.

I have been astounded ever since arriving at the welcome centre. Firstly, the slopes here are so empty. If you're familiar with snow fields in Australia or New Zealand you'll know how busy they normally are. I was expecting chaos, but because there are just so many slopes around here, they remain very relaxed and free of crowds. Also, everything runs like clockwork - there's a free shuttle bus every 15 minutes and there are no queues when hiring gear or buying lift tickets. In fact, once we were delivered to our lodge we were whisked into the sitting room and the manager (a Canadian girl) had ordered our discounted lift tickets, made us a dinner reservation, brought us a cup of tea and organised a private lesson for me tomorrow in a matter of minutes.

To top it all off we were told that at 5:00pm there would be Welcome Drinks held in the bar. This turned out to be an incredibly fun few hours where we were given class after glass of sparkling, white and red (on the house!) and chatted with lots of great new people. The owner of the lodge is a Frenchman and all the wine is from his vineyard in Burgundy. He is a really interesting man - he's married to a Chinese woman and they spend 6 months of the year in Hong Kong, then they spend the Summer in France and each Winter in Niseko. What a life! This lodge is amazing, I'll let the photos speak for themselves.

On the right is the lodge and on the left is the restaurant

Our room

Sitting room

In the bottom cupboard there are hundreds of DVDs you can choose from to take back to your room!

Long table with fireplace on the left

The small cosy bar

Icicles outside our window!

We can't wait to hit the slopes tomorrow. Niseko is said to have snow that it is lighter, fluffier and drier than anywhere else in the world. All the better for me to fall onto!