So now I am back in Nagaoka and this morning I went to get the hire car back before picking up Gene from Koi Village along with Martin and Marjike DeJong who are joining us for a few days.

Its great to have Martin and Marjike with us as they both love taking pictures and have a great website where they publish them called Koi Foto.  Martin agreed to let me use some of the pictures on the blog if neccesary which meant I could concentrate on working with Gene to fulfill the koi he needs.  Today was really about Gene finding his feet and seeing what was available around the various breeders before deciding where to select from.

First stop was Marudoh koi farm where we had a look at what was available and agreed to call back if Gene wanted to select.  It is always interesting for me to make the first visit with a new client and observe which koi attracts them.  Immediately it was obvious that Gene is certainly no fool when it comes to selecting koi which means its going to be a really enjoyable week.

After leaving Marudo we called into Torazo quickly before stopping at Otsuka.  We had a look at the larger koi first and a few koi where definately the type of stuff we were looking for but unfortuantely the pond was sold koi.  We intended to call in to Oya but the houses were locked and Kataoka san may well have not got back from the koi show in Tosu city yet.

After a few more stops at Shinoda, Hiroi, Masaki and Yagenji we headed back to Ojiya for some lunch before calling in to see Hasegawa san, where as always a bit of gossip was traded between us about things we had found out recently.  Whilst there Gene was very impressed with the tosai and nisai available.  Hasegawa san has not yet made his final selection of tosai but we have a great relationship and so after a lot of banter I was able to twist his arm on the option of some tategoi tosai later in the week.

After this it was off to Hosakai and then back through to Marusei where the ponds were absolutely crammed with fish.  We also had a quick look in Maruhiro sans koi house across the road and arranged to visit his tosai house later in the week.We then went to see Yamazaki but Manabu san was just about to leave to help unload the truck which had returned from the koi show at the weekend, so we decided to go and take a few pictures there, first calling at the Miyakoya dry goods store for Gene to pick up the latest breeders book, and also I needed to check availability of some stuff I had been asked to get.

After calling at the Shinkokai office to take a few pics of the breeders hard at work unloading the truck it was pretty much time to call it a day and Gene needed a few bits in town, including some postcards so we headed back to Nagaoka.  Postcards would seem a simple request but it is something I have never previously been asked for so I had my thinking hat on all the way back as to where we could find some.  We wandered over to the station area and my first idea was a stroke of luck as we managed to locate a beatiful pack of postcards with many great scenes from Yamakoshi.  After this we wandered over the other side where we bumped into Shintaro and his family who had just been to the induction of their eldest son Kensuke at the high school just by the New Otani Hotel.  I know that they are very proud of Kensuke achieving high enough marks to gain entry to this school as it is the best in the area, although I'm not sure Kensuke enjoyed the ban on skiing Hirome san imposed this winter to ensure he studied hard.  Anyway as he is now going to be a Nagaoka "local" I suggested a regular meet with him in Starbucks at tea time ;o).  I think Hirome san was as happy wbout this as Kensuke was about the lack of skiing.