Matt

Sakura blossoms out in full bloom here today!

Originally Posted By: gurgle Nice piccies guys....look at all the people in Zao - About as busy as Happo back country....!!! Where do you work Matt ? I Run a lodge in Hakuba Gurgle. been raining here most of the day btw. Should clear tomorrow..

Well...it's raining now but the morning was nice. I couldn't make it out but one of our staff plus a few mates took the camera up and did some easy lines of the back of Happo. Looks like Spring has arrived now so t-shirt weather, park days and corn lines in the backcountry to look forward too.

Congrats to the wee one Stemik! Thats quite an achievement when you consider the level of skill of the youngsters in this town. The elementary school actually has a "miniature" ski jump in the back yard thats actually pretty big and all the kids have to jump off it for P.E.! I think someone asked for some pics from yesterday (Tuesday)...Here are some plus a vid. good as it gets!

Today the morning started off almost bottomless and was dumping so hard it ended up bottomless by the end. Epic mid season-like conditions with deep dry powder and cold temps. Could have done with a face mask. It was still nuking when we left at the end of the day and is forecast to snow until about 6am and then the sun's supposed to come out so tomorrow is gonna be epic. Heres a vid from this afternoon.

Here are some shots from Saturday. Good in the trees. Bottomless on the top half, feeling the base underneath on the bottom half. The snow was getting heavier on the sunny sides by lunchtime. The fresh snow in the trees reminded me of cherry blossom season! Another 10cm in my car park & Cortina reporting another 20cm last night so it should be good today!

Great day today - Bluebird not a breath of wind and maybe 35-40cm fresh at Cortina. Seemed like every local from Hakuba was there today!

Went to Cortina. Much the same as TJ, 20cm of fresh. 20cm of fresh on a hard base = not so much fun. 20cm of fresh on a soft sludgy base = great! Could really let it rip in the trees without worrying about hitting a hard base. Surprisingly good. Gonna be 15 degrees (!:0)in the valley tomorrow but hopefully Sunday will bring us a stealth dump at the top end of the valley. Here are some pics from today. Can you spot Junko in the pic?

Try reading the archives here for an idea of how long stuff usually stays open. In Hakuba's case the last ten years I've been here every season apart from last season had full coverage with all runs open into early April. Some of the mountains close earlier than others. Iwatake closes in the first week of April as does Cortina (not for lack of snow!) Happo, Tsugaike and Goryu/47 all stay open until the end of Golden week.

Today (friday) was almost as good as yesterday. The north faces were still holding good powder down to about 1100m. Anything remotely in the sun was cooked very quickly though. Another stunning day with beutiful views! I don't think the powder will last tomorrow unfortunately... Some pics from today

Wednesday was nice but very very wet snow (about 25-30cm maybe) Today was much much better. Probably another 30cm of fresh on the mountain last night - much drier, proper powder - faceshots galore today at Tsugaike. Still can't seem to post video...

After the powder settles for a few days its not deep but you aren't hitting a hard base

Originally Posted By: Go Native Ok there appears to have been some confusion over the use of the term 'bottomless' when referring to skiing/boarding. I think it would be good if we all got on the same page in it's usage. First off bottomless does not refer to snow depth. It's an adjective to describe turns in unconsolidated powder snow where you can't feel the consolidated base at the bottom. If your edges are biting into the base on a turn then it is not bottomless. For me true bottomless turns are about the best feeling you can have skiing. The turns seem effortless as you just float d

Monday hiked up and hour and a half from the top lift of Happo to Mume-zawa did the north face and got great powder with no crust underneath for 800m vertical. Yesterday (tuesday) hiked half an hour up from the top of 47/Goryu and got about 400m of good north facing powder with no hard base underneath followed by 400m of crud. Today I suspect it will all be crud however far you walk as the freezing level going up will mean even north faces will be toast. Got a good video from Yesterday but haven't been able to post it yet on snowjapanTV...Can I embed youtube videos on here??

yeah Hakuba's a different dynamic from Niseko for sure. Niseko had an undersupply of properties to start with. Hakuba had an oversupply - Half of the properties that are left are empty and falling down. Wadano and to a lesser extent Echoland are two places that have started to see renewal which is good to see. Unless Hakuba goes sky high, Which it could if the mountains get together and offer an all mountain pass and start connecting resorts, speculation is probably not going to be an option. Anything bought is either going to be a lifestyle buy or is going to have to have a sol