Hi from Montana

As 2019 turned into 2022 and “covid 19” turned into just “covid”, it became increasingly clear that Japan was not going to let us in for the 2021-22 winter. This is sad news, because I have been eating sub-par rice for FAR TOO LONG.

Anyway, I wasn’t going to sit through another Australian summer. So instead, I packed my bags, donned my mask, stuck a PCR swab into the bottom of my brain and got on a flight to the US.

2020 Japan Write-Up

2020 Japan Write-Up

I was about to write my customary apology for getting this end-of-season wrap up out a bit late. But then I realised it’s still March. The spring skiing is great in Hokkaido. I only left a week ago.

But a lot has changed in the last few weeks.

It seems a bit strange to write an end-of-season wrap up now. Skiing is a strange thing to be thinking about in the face of a global pandemic. But as I lay on the couch mid-quarantine in the Blue Mountains west of Sydney (all international travellers are required to self-quarantine for two weeks upon returning to Australia. We got to choose where we’d hang out. Now the army escorts you to a hotel) I recalled a conversation with a new guest, Magnus, back in February. He’d had a bit of a logistical debacle getting to Hokkaido and as we shuttled around collecting replacement gear he said something like:

“This is still worth it. If we get a few great powder turns, those moments stay with us for the whole year.”

State of the Backcountry Jan 2020

State of the Backcountry Jan 2020

This is the first in a hopefully semi-regular series of updates about conditions in central Hokkaido and wherever else we end up touring. It’s easy to have grand plans about updating the website, but those plans pretty quickly fall away in the thick of guiding, exploring, and riding good lines. So if you don’t see an update for a while, that probably means the snow is good and we’ve prioritised “information gathering” over sitting in front of the laptop.

Kurodake dates for 2020

Kurodake dates for 2020

This is getting a bit redundant, since Rinyu Kanko (the corporation that run the Kurodake Ropeway website) have updated their website and it’s now easy to navigate in English, but here are the closure dates for Kurodake this winter:

  • The ropeway is closed from the 6th to the 31st of January (the chairlift is also closed for this period, since you need to ride the ropeway to get to the lift). It reopens on Saturday the 1st of Feb.

  • The chairlift is closed for another three weeks, until the 21st of February.

Plan your touring in the alpine above Sounkyo for February, and plan your big days for the last week of Feb and March.

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