As today being our last one in Niigata , I wasn’t expecting to see or buy a great deal .Due to the fact that Virgin fly fairly early, we have to be at the airport the night before the flight , meaning todays adventures in the mountains were always going to be cut short ! , but once again I diddnt have to worry as two of our dealers come up trumps again . First stop was Kazuto , this guy we havnt been to for a while as his fish are of a very high grade , and as you will know the price normally matches the quality . On arrival we went into the main house  where the little pond houses a few numbers of extremely high grade nisai . I bowled up an extremely high quality sanke with a beautiful yon dan pattern , the fish was as good as it looked swimming around in the pond .After asking the price I was surprised that it wasn’t  unreasonable for the quality of the sanke infront of me , just too much to spend on one koi on the last day .In another koi house a nisai kohaku was bowled , this koi had an extremely good body , one I thought would certainly grow  very big , the breeder must have read my mind as within seconds of the koi going in the bowl he stated that fact without even being asked ! Once again the price was asked , and again seemed reasonable for the quality of the koi , but still a lot of money so taking some time to think about it . From here we moved on to one of our favourites Yamamatsu koi farm , Sakai was waiting for us and again we were greeted by the eternal cup of green tea , I used to laugh when people said to me they like it , but I have to say after nearly 30 trips to Japan it is starting to grow on me , and now I don’t have to look for the nearest plant pot ! What I like about this breeder is he always interested in what we are doing , always asking how he can help to improve our business and we can work with each other to improve our respected companies . I always tell him we need to raise the quality and thatb I needed some showa  , he then took us to a pond and some showa bowled , but they were not really the quality we were looking for , so Ken ( sakai work staff ) started bowling sanke , I said showa Ken san , he repolied quality Gary san , I laughed and started looking through the sanke that they had bowled , there were some very nice examples in the bowl , including a great male with a very interesting pattern and great sumi quality . I started looking in the pond and was then joined by Mark Chetter and we were pointing out koi for Ken to net and his head was soon spinning . After many koi bowled and some put back , I had about 8 great nisai that were all female in the bowl , and one very nice sanke . We got another bowl with clean water and moved what we thought were the best three into the new bowl . I was stunned , the quality was way above and beyond what I expected , and better than the two I had purchased a few days before . Sakai returned and I asked him to be nice to me , he said No and then laughed and gave me the price , way more than the last two ,  but looking at the quality I wasn’t surprised and diddnt argue and shook his hand . Three very nice sanke  , all female , nisai and around 50cm on the last day , bar well and truly raised and happy chappy me ! I then looked through what was left and we moved another three slightly smaller into the bowl , Sakai and his son looked at the male left in the bowl and shook their heads , I took the hint and immediately moved it into the clean water ,im glad I did , the male and the three females were also very high quality , and the price was asked and once again I was over the moon and bought all four . Seven very high grade sanke on the last day , it couldn’t get better , could it ???????? Then I remembered we hadn’t seen sansai showa that we had left last year , so looking at younsai and was hoping for around 65cm and some good improvement ! When bowled up she was bang on 65cm and a gret body , especially for showa , I was intending to leave her again , but we have a nice collection of fish in Japan , so its time to get some home and sell them ! So another cup of green for good measure and then it was hand shakes all round , photographs and time to say good bye . From here we headed down the mountain  as we had to visit our old friend Maruhiro , as that morning I had sold one of the Azukari koi and had to change the paperwork and ship the hi utsuri that we had purchased as the customer wants it shipped . On arrival we asked for some nice quality showa to be bowled , we purchased a nisai that we looked at yesterday ,outstaning quality but very expensive , but i had been thinking of it over night and decieded to buy her today .Then three smaller nisai were selected and the hi utsuri paperwork was changed . As i was finishing up i noticed that he has brought in some very nice Chagoi , so within a few minutes id caught up some of them , struggling to make a box up we went to another pond and picked up some better quality nisai and finished the day off  nicely . Once again another great trip , one shared with Mark Chetter who was with us in the winter harvest and decided to return a few months later for this one . Visited most of the breeders we want to deal with , selected some fantastic koi from the likes of Maruhiro , Marusei , Shintaro , Sakai and Torazo . The only farm we diddnt visit that we wanted to was Isa , as he was away in the Philapines for a koi show . Once again proving that we literally can go into any farm in Niigata and buy koi at ANY level ! This trip hopefully has raised the quality of the koi we purchase out here on our travels , but i guess ony you csn be the judge of that !!!! Take care and see you all soon.....