On January 18th we arrived at Shiga Kogen Resort for fresh groomers and a wee bit a pow. It was a beautiful bluebird day so you could still see the Northern Alps we left behind in Hakuba. We spent half a day exploring Japan's biggest ski resort, and then had lunch on the mountain. After lunch we made our way to Jugokudani Monkey Park to see the famous monkey onsen. Here are a few pics of the tour.
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On March 3rd a whole crew of us found powder paradise. Our very own Powder Paradise in fact. See if you can spot anyone else in the resort?! You can read about it here.
Rich, one of the Snow Season Japan guests that came and stayed for the 2011 season, made this awesome little video about this awesome powder day. Makes me "Woohoohoo!" everytime I watch it!
Thanks, Rich!
We woke up to 30 cm of fresh pow and sunshine on March 11. Yasu and I headed up to Goryu for fresh tracks and then headed back to tabi-tabi to make the switch from snowboards to our yuki-ita. Just as we were about the head out, Amir and Aisa arrived from Tokyo and decided to join us for a bindingless boarding challenge.
Once on the board they became instant yuki-ita fans. We got plenty of fresh lines, and a lot more laughs. Aisa remembers the ground moving once when we were there but thought it was just the Chu-hi (Japanese sho-chu and soda in a can) hitting her. We had plenty of fun until our stomachs grumbled and decided it was time for some local soba (buck-wheat noodle soup). I stepped into the restaurant first and noticed everyone glued to the television. Had a look myself but couldn't make any sense of it. Yasu came in, had a look, and said, "Tsunami!". We instantly lost our appetite and started making calls to all those people we thought might be affected but almost all the lines were dead or busy.
We frantically returned home, started watching the news for updates, and continued making calls. Eventually friends and family were all accounted for but on the news the scenes of destruction and death tolls continued to rise and rise. Amir went back to Tokyo on Sunday and called us when he got back. All seemed OK but there was very little food in the supermarket, and absolutely no rice to be found. "We'll send you some!" but turned out courier services weren't making deliveries to Tokyo.
Hakuba got a 40 cm dump while Yasu and I were thigh deep in flowers on the other side of Japan. Read about it here
After surfing pow on my new Yuki-ita, we were itching to see some waves so off to the ocean we went:
It felt great to stretch our eyes out to the horizon:
When in Japan, especially when you are near the ocean, do as the Japanese do, and feast on some seafood!Nihon-kai (The Japanese sea) is said to bear some of the best delicacies,because of its frigid temperatures fish are fattier, and therefore even tastier. This is a great fish market along the west coast of Japan:
With so much choice we had a lot of trouble choosing:
Eventually we went with this HUGE buri (yellowtail) for only 1500 yen:
and the friendly fish butcher cleaned it up for us at no charge:
when we got home Yasu made Buri Shabu Shabu:
There is always powder somewhere..... so back on the road we went. It was a beautiful sunny day for a drive and the size of the snowbanks on the mountain roads looked very promising:
Had an great day on the mountain and even spotted an smokin' volcano:
As usual Yasu brought his best powder boards including my new yuki-ita, the one and only, Super Fabulous! "yuki" means snow and "ita" means board. There is currently a bit of an underground scene happening and more and more lovers of pow are unstrapping their bindings, dropping their factory made branded boards and switching to handmade, bindingless, planks perfect for a more natural surfer's high!
Today we met a lot of other like-minded snowsurfers from Toyama:
Yoroshiku!
Woke up at 5 and 8 of us were on the road by 6.
We drove for 2 hours through the Japanese countryside:
and snowy mountain roads:
then found powder paradise:
Needless to say, we were pretty excited:
We showed our appreciation and worshipped the Goddess of snow by spreading her offerings around ... until we couldn't take anymore and partook in the ritual of bathing in thermal waters granted to us by mother earth.
We were then blessed with more offerings from the sea as we filled up on sushi:
Yasu's back still wasn't ready to shred so off to another onsen we went. This time we drove towards the coast into Otari. We went for a long drive down winding roads with snowbanks higher than our van. The road ends where the plows stop plowing which put us in front of Yamada Ryokan (Japanese style inn). The indoor bath is small but the water is potent. I had the place to myself so could sneak in a quick snap.
The place is old and ageing but I prefer a bit of character and a whole lot of history over bland and sterile. I hear the waters have been flowing here for over 500 years!!
