Late last year, Lexi told me that she wanted to go to Japan. I\u2019ve always wanted to go to Japan and I figured this would be an awesome opportunity for me to go check out the country. I imagined I would eventually go with a my friends Nathan and Grace, who have a strong connection to the country and would love to do some type of cycling adventure (particularly, uni!). But that hasn\u2019t panned out, and this was a great time to go. Lexi had images of skiing in super light powder in Hokkaido, and that was her primary goal. She asked me what I wanted to do there, and my response was \u201cI want to see the snow monkeys that sit in the hot springs\u201d.<\/strong>\u00a0Lexi did all the planning for the trip, and figured out that the snow monkeys are near Nozawa Onsen. Luckily there was some skiing in that town, and we spent a few days there. I think that town was one of my favorite part of the trip. Originally our plan was to just \u201cplay it by ear\u201d and book things a few days in advance, but we were going to be there during New Years, and that is a primary travel time in Japan since New Years is a big deal. So we had to pre-book places to stay, or we wouldn\u2019t be able to go anywhere. I\u2019m super grateful for her doing so much planning and work. I created a short video highlighting our favorite parts of the trip.<\/p>\n