Tonight being the 8th of the month, the restaurant called 八方園 (pronounced 'Happouen') does a 食べ放題 (all you can eat) dinner of 焼き肉 (grilled meat) lasting 90 minutes for 2980 yen (about £20) including a drink. We went along with a couple of friends of ours, Taro and Miho, and after all opting for a beer as our drink, then proceeded to order copious amounts of meat to cook to our liking on the grill in front of us.

What was interesting though was the セセリ (pronounced 'seseri' - the light meat at the bottom of the first photo). None of us knew what it was, so we asked the lady and were told it was meat from the neck area of chickens. It was certainly very tasty and we enjoyed more than one plate. We ordered a plate of everything on the menu just to try them, but I think everybody's favourite was the ハラミ ('harami') coated with salt (塩) and lemon sauce; it was fantastic!

As a really kind gesture once we'd paid the bill, perhaps because we were the last people remaining in the restaurant, we were brought free strawberry ice cream. I'd love to go back again, but unfortunately we won't be around for the 8th of next month!

Well of course I wanted to bring Liz, our visiting friend, to our favourite eaterie Ichibun! The master seemed prepared too, as he surprised us with a couple of new dishes.

First up was a salad of まぐろ (tuna) on dressed cabbage, which was scoffed in an instant. Then he brought us a ドリア (doria), made with rice and seafood and covered with melted cheese. Finally after we had ordered and consumed a couple of our regular dishes (ramen etc) he brought us a complimentary dessert of lemon ice cream with berry compote and home-made strawberry jam. And as always everything else was 500 yen a dish (about £3.50).

Hopefully Liz was convinced of Ichibun's calibre after that. (I'm seriously going to miss Ichibun's food!)

First let me state that these weren't all mine! There were five of us, and after coffee in Tully's this afternoon we decided that we had to take Liz to Masamura (マサムラ) as they're probably the most famous cake shop in Matsumoto (松本).

The four cakes in the photo coated with icing sugar are the main reason we love this shop; cream-custard filled choux buns (シュークリーム). The baby ones were 110 yen (about 70p) and the large one 200 yen.

This weekend our friend Liz visited us from down in Shiga prefecture, and her main objective (apart from to see us of course) was to see the snow monkeys, for which Nagano is famous. We hadn't yet been either so today was a great chance to go.

A great number of macaque monkeys come to Jigokudani Monkey Park (地獄谷野猿公苑) in the winter months to bathe in the hot natural water. Despite not having any snow coverage yet it was still fascinating to watch so many monkeys together, enjoying themselves and completely oblivious to the people taking photographs. I guess they must be used to it by now!

I was particularly amused seeing the monkeys after they'd dipped their heads in the water. It was like their heads had suddenly shrunk! I commented that I thought it made them look a bit more like old men.

There's a great website about the park and access to it and its environs here. The map provided helped us to find the lower parking area and from there we took the quiet 1.6km track through the forest to get to the park.

Here are four of my favourite photos from the day.

I took my friend Yuzo for lunch today to Misoya (みそや), a popular miso ramen (味噌ラーメン) restaurant in front of Nagano station. There are only counter seats available, and at meal times you often have to wait for a seat. Today we were lucky though and got a seat straightaway.

While I'm not so keen on 'ordinary' miso ramen, this one I really enjoy. It has quite a lot of garlic in it, and a reasonably strong flavour. The pork meat (チャーシュー) is also very tasty, and the soup goes very well with the plentiful beansprouts and green onions on top. But I can't quite pin down why I find it so enjoyable, I just do.

Anyway it's just 650 yen (about £4) and well worth a visit if you need to eat quickly around Nagano station.