surfarthur
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Posts posted by surfarthur
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Yes the trail map makes things look quite steep. Most of the red runs are pretty similar, quite flat in places with short slightly steeper pitches. The green trail from east mountain over to Mt Isola is quite narrow, but well fenced from memory.
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Thanks guys!
I've been to Sahoro the year before,and Niseko village last year. Yes,Sahoro's really good for their free group lessons! I found some of Niseko village's green and blue slopes with turns without fences around the top rather scary. Does Rusutsu offer easy runs from mountain top? Their trail map shows only blue runs from mountain top and no green runs. Are their green and blue runs harder and steeper than Kiroro? I would like to do some leisure skiing with my girlfriend this time, so I won't be taking any lessons. Kiroro sounds good as we can go to Otaru for dinners and stuff. 
Yes, there are easy runs from the mountain tops. West mountain has a green course from the top (although West mountain is quite short) and red courses from the top of East mountain and Mt Isola. Check out this video of the Heavenly View course from the top of Mt Isola, it will give you a fairly good idea of the types of runs you can expect over on Isola.
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Rusutsu is great, but as per Alex's suggestion, the lessons are not cheap unless you speak fluent Japanese. They have English speaking instructors, but they are only available for private lessons. If your budget covers it, or you can muster up your own group, then great, but lessons are an important consideration. I can't comment on any of the other resorts, not having been there, but if lessons are important to you, I would suggest finding out what lessons are available at the resort that you choose. A quick look on the Rusutsu and Kiroro websites indicates that only private lessons are available.
Other than the lessons, Rusutsu provides relatively long, gentle slopes with perfect grooming. Some of the runs do have great views.
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Received my travel documents today. Roll on January!
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Done. Can't wait to get my hands on them.
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Thanks SJD, I guess I just need to be patient (something that I am not very good at).
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Thanks for putting this list together snowjunky. Looking forward to seeing who else might be at the same resorts and possibly meeting up for a beer (or some sliding) with some people from the SJ forums. All I need now is one of those new SJ stickers for my helmet! (When are we going to be able to get these by the way?)
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Very interesting Ippy.
I watched the 2011 Burton Canadian open on the weekend, on the TV coverage, they said that Burton was putting up equal prize money for both sexes. Does anyone know if it was just this event or across the board (pun intended) at all burton open events? Either way, it is a step in the right direction, and makes our sport one of the most progressive in terms of equality of the sexes.
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In the calendar section you can see when everyone's birthday is
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We need a dry slope over here in Perth!
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Furano for 5 nights from the 15th Jan, then 7 nights at Rusutsu. Can't wait till January!
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I am going to Furano, 14 Jan for 5 nights, then to Rusutsu for 7 nights, can't wait!
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I'm with you on that one GN, we can do without a "mad monk" running this country!
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Just ship them off down under, most of them would fit right in without much hassle.
If you send them by boat, they might end up in Malaysia
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I am still hoping the rates will swing back more in favour of the AUD, else my budget will be very tight, should be doable still though, having already booked for Furano and Rusutsu in Jan, I will just have to do a bit of extra overtime between now and then if the rates don't improve. I would be absolutely gutted if I had to cancel our trip.
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I am interested too Mamabear, where do we find more info on this?
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Originally Posted By: bobby12I predict that this was organised by someone or some group. What is needed is 'a tipping point' (I guess many of you have read the book), ie. that first act of vandalism in the day to kick it all off. I think someone is creating these tipping points around the UK by getting their gang members or whoever to start incidents, and then use the crowd-effect to recruit a small army for free to protect you while you target the mobile-phone shops etc.
In other words, I think either gangs or possibly anarchist groups are kick starting incidents in order to use the ignorant crowd (kids etc) as a shield while doing crime.
Somebody has to do that first vandalism act of the day, from there it all kicks off. And someone has to rally people into the one spot to congragate.
A friend of mine in London reckons that Sainsburys as a ploy to get some panic buying of food going.
On a more serious note, I hope that the police are able to bring things under control soon. I cant imagine what the people of these areas (that aren't involved with the rioting) are going through. I personally think that the police need to crack a few skulls with their knightsticks - its the only thing that these thugs will understand. -
I am looking forward to good Ramen almost as much as the snowboarding. Roll on January
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It also means that anyone who was planning to go to any resort that is not open this winter will probably go to other resorts in the region, which hopefully will increase the likelihood of these other resorts staying open.
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Nice work Mamabear - I really must start getting in shape, only a little over 5 months to go till Furano and Rusutsu.
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Mamabear, you can have the Quantas flight from Perth for the same price - they throw in a free flight to the east coast, so it will take a bit longer!
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Try Europe if you want to avoid the radiation... no wait, the radioactive cloud made it there too
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Where to begin? Well, first of all, the plane was late taking off. We were sitting at the terminal waiting for the plane to arrive, and so were the quantas staff, peering out the window wondering where the plane is. I realise that sometimes planes are late, but there was no information about what was happening5 minutes after we were due to be in the air, the plane finally arrives. The worst plane in the Quantas fleet. So we finally all board the plane. Then taxi out to the runway. Then the captain informs us that we have to go back to the terminal to collect some important safety documents that someone forgot. Way to convince your passengers that Quantas is a safe airline!. The in flight entertainment consisted of 1 big screen at the front of the plane playing some crappy movie. They did not have the drinks that we wanted which were clearly on their menu, not just on the way to Tokyo, but also on the way back (here's a hint Quantas, if you are not going to stock it, take it off your menu!) Add in extra time in the air due to a volcanic eruption, and many of the people on the flight missed their connections due to arriving 2.5 hrs late. Fortunately we had 5 days in Tokyo so this did not affect our holiday much. To the credit of JAL, they had staff waiting as soon as everyone got off the plane and they helped everyone that missed their connections.
What I object to is not being informed of what is going on, incompetence by Quantas staff, and paying for a quality airline and getting budget airline service.
Ok, gripe over, had an awesome holiday and can't wait to be back in Japan in January.
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TBH, after the service we got from Quantas, there was no way we were going to use them again. We would have paid the extra anyway just to avoid them, so when they cancelled the Perth-Tokyo route it made the decision easy. Looking forward to getting good service from Cathay, just wish we could afford a stopover in HK, would be great to have a look around there.
pow pow boards
in Snow talk, trip reports, Japan avalanche & backcountry
Posted
I have a burton supermodel 159, great board, rides well on the groomers, floats well in the pow.