Day 5

Day 5 and we thought we was done for buying stock and customer requests.

So we popped in to see Marusei koi farm where he was doing his Nisai sembetsu.
And he showed us some Chisa Nisai he had netted up, 500 where available to select through. So we grabbed some bowls and hand selected 50 fish.
Was hard work as the weather was fantastic today and it was very warm.
All fish where 25 - 30cm. And they will be available and very good prices.

After there we headed to see Yamazaki again where he had more Nisai to see what he had loaded his ponds up with what wasn't available the other day. So again we couldn't resist so had to have another mix of Hariwake, Ochiba and Aka Matsuba and Purachina.

And that is pretty much us done for buying fish now. Well over 250 fish will be heading back to the UK to join us at the shop in a couple of weeks.

Day 4

Bit late with the update from yesterday. But we went round to see a few more breeders. First of all we went to see Marusaka koi farm and hand selected some nisai mettalics. In the mix we bought Hariwake, Beni kikokuruy, Kikusui, Kin Ki Utsuri, and Yamabuki and Doitsu Purachina.

Then of we went to visit Hosokai Koi Farm and hand selected a sansai Aka Matsuba. Nisai Kujaku and Nisai Showa.

Then went to watch Kawakami to his sembetsu on Kumomryu, then had another look in his Nisai house and hand selected some Nisai Goshiki and a Sanke.

Further on the visit to Kawakami we popped in to see Maruhiro again and hand selected another mix of Nisai.

Then back to the hotel for the night.

Day 3 in japan

First appointment was at maruju koi farm to hand select through his tosai tateshita goromo and showa.The koi were netted for our inspection and we selected 25 pieces, the goromo are the best ive seen.Then shigeyoshi invited us for some lunch with him ,which was very nice.From there we when to see yamazaki to hand select nisai, we entered his fish house which was full with koi, i asked a few prices on his sansai and yonsai, the prices were so reasonable we bought 6 from 50cm upto 70cm, i have never seen such good koi at this size for such reasonable prices before, called into marusaka but bought nothing, then onto torazo for Tancho only to find he had none, he had kohaku and sanke though, and not a bad price,we bought 2 kohaku and female sanke that i fell in love with, then headed back to the hotel after another busy day.

Got to facebook to view some pictures from today.

Second day out in the mountains

So today it got if to a great start, we went to see shinoda and selected through some of his tateshita. We bought 30 in total. Mixed size of 12cm up to 35cm there are some absolute jewels in there.

When we looked at them we decided we would have 15 from his tateshita, so he went ahead and netted the pond for us and we went through every fish. And as we where going through them we couldn't just take 15 as there was 30 individual fish that we just had to get as they was better than we expected. Really impressive fish.

We then went and visited Kawakami and selected through his nisai. Straight away a shiro utsuri caught our eye. Once that was that was bowled up we then spotted another with lots of under lying sumi with a big body, so in the bowl that went aswell. Along with a goshiki with a lot of red and a lovely body shape. We also got two really nice kohaku with really good beni quality with and amazing white skin to compliment the red. That then completed the sale with kawakami.

On the road we went again into mushigame to go and visit yagengi to view his tosai but as we had a booking with hirashin we didn't have chance to select any of his tosai.

We then arrived at hirashin koi farm where we walked up to the pond with his nisai, we where blown away my the intense mettalic lusture of his yamabuki, possibly the best yamabuki nisai we have seen in a long time. Straight away we asked him to get a bowl ready and we started netting up some of the koi.
We selected 4 absolutely perfect yamabuki to make up a box. We then netted 2 goshiki along with a near perfect mizuho ogon.

We them went of and had some lunch in a ramen bar which was very tasty. Something I'd love to have again.

Then we headed back to see Maruhiro again and selected 100 small tosai from 12 to 18cm.

We also headed up and called into see kase to check out his tosai. We didn't select any as we had already bought a lot today. But may end up popping in later on this week to get some.

Then we headed back to ogiya and called in for a coffee at hasegawa. He has just graded some nisai kohaku and sanke but were expensive, but very serious quality.

And now we are back in the hotel room after an early start feeling exhausted.

After a lovely start to the day with the sun being out the rain has just set in now.

Check out the facebook page as we have just uploaded a load of pictures from today

First full day

Well its 6.13 in the morning.
Weather looks a little better than it did yesterday but far from sunny. Hoping to get around a few breeders today.
Yesterday we bought and seen some lovely fish. Hopefully today will be a little better. Not feeling jet legged at all. Think the few beers before bed sorted that out. We also went out for a meal last night in a traditional Japanese restraunt with Chris and Maruhiro. Was a good night and the food was superb.

Heading of at 9 to see Shinoda to pick through his tosai doitsu go sanke. And then before dinner heading to see Kawakami.

Will be getting as many photos as possible today and will be uploading them via the Facebook page as for some reason my phone isn't allowing me to add multiple images on here.

Each time I put some fresh pictures on Facebook I will add a link on here.

If you haven't already checked out the pictures from yesterday, go and have a look now just click here

Photos from today

Go to www.Facebook.com/holmeswood koi to see the pictures from today. I cant get them to upload from my phone to the blog.

Touch down.

So today we landed in Japan after a long journey. A flight to Zurich and then an exchange over to Narita airport. Then took the express train from the terminal and swapped over onto to Bullet train over to Niigata. We where a little jet legged today but still got to see 2 breeders and Bought a few fish already. First of all we stopped of and had a Coffee with Maruhiro and then had a select through a variety of his lovely koi. And picked out a box full. A few little jewels and then we went round to see kaneko and picked out some lovely fish from him. We also had a look and bowled up some of his larger shiro utsuri. Were currently at the hotel at the moment and heading out for tea shortly with Chris and Marahiro will be joining us. We have plenty planned for tommorow so will be updating with more news.

Not long to go now

Sooner than we know it well be on our way to Japan to select some high quality koi for our stock and individuals for customers. Its only a week on Monday when we will be jetting of to Japan. Remember well be updating this blog on a daily basis whilst we are out there so don't forget to keep checking it out to see which breeders we have been to visit and some of the koi that will be coming back to the shop. Don't forget whilst me and Barry are out there the shop will still be open as normal. Dave is staying put and looking after the shop for the time we are in Japan.