Plucky

This past holiday weekend (memorial day in the states), I drove down to Homer, Alaska. First, I had to drive 400 miles to Anchorage, meet friends, and then drive another 200 miles to Homer. It took a total of 18 hours. It was so worth it though! What a beautiful place on this planet. Just great people down there too. This is Homer Spit. All the tourist shops, Restaurants, etc... were down there. Tons of camping and RV's too. We camped above town, however - no wind, lotsa bears, but a lot quieter! The landscape here in Alaska amazes me. This was taken from the Glenn Hig

Quote: Originally posted by Kintaro: I should mention that one of the few times I went with a friend we headed up North, hit Hakkoda and the next day Appi..where I broke my leg. If I had been alone, I have no idea how I would have gotten to a hospital and then back to Sendai. I do take that into consideration now when I plan long distance snowboard trips. Was this the trip you called me and I had a blown knee and couldn't go? Oh, and I hate waiting for snowboarders (email me sometime damnit! Alaska awaits you!) I've skied alone many times. I've also climbed a lot of mountai

I'm not sure what the biggest dump in the mountains was, but I did experience a couple of 30 inch + (approx 75 cm) dumps in the coastal town of Misawa (Northern Pacific Honshu). This usually happened over a 6-12 hour period. I can only imagine what the mountains received when the town was getting hammered by blizzards. It was hard to know, however, since all of the roads were essentially shut down for a couple days after dumps like this. Japan gets a ton of snow but it usually comes pretty late (I consider mid to late December late). Best bet for deep and good pow is mid Jan thru

The Iwate ski areas don't get a lot of press on here, but there is some great terrain and snow to be had! Appi, however, is an overblown, overcrowded, horribly designed Japanese yuppie resort that isn't even close to being worth the price of admission. It is good for some early season turns when other places aren't open yet, but besides that, there are a lot of other places in the valley that blow Appi's doors off. My favorite place in Iwate was easily Hachimantai Forest. The place has a funky set up but it gives it a unique charm and quaintness that is hard to find at other Nippon r

In Misawa/Northern Honshu? March thru November.

Quote: yes OCEAN 11 you are right.i am using the same theory.as moon is closest to earth but is very small as compared to other planets still it effect our ocean tides so why cant jupiter or saturn which is much far away from earth can effect tectonic plates of earth because of there size.as you all know that size of jupiter is equal to 1300 earth and has very strong gravity. one of the reason for tsunami occured in indonesia on 26 dec 2004 was on 26 dec 2004 it was full moon and as you all know that tides rises very high on full moon. i have found in my research that major earthquakes like k

Hey SubZero, I'm still kind of new up here, so I don't know a lot of the areas all that well. The state is just so damn big - it's going to take a lifetime to see everything! I live in the interior of Alaska where there actually aren't that many ski resorts (or people for that matter). We have 4 places to ski within an hour of my house, but 2 of them are pretty pathetic. You probably wouldn't want to come up here in the winter anyway. Temps from Nov-Mar are usually around -30C and can get colder! I'm not that familiar with the Anchorage area as this trip was my first one dow

Quote: Originally posted by scoobydoo: Great stuff. Are you actually originally from Alaska Plucky? No, I grew up in Oregon actually. I did my masters research in Alaska back in '99 and fell in love with the place though. When the opportunity to actually move to AK presented itself last year, I sprung on it. I love it up here

Quote: Originally posted by SerreChe: ah, here is one: http://www.news24.com/News24/Technology/News/0,,2-13-1443_1661667,00.html I've never heard this phenomenon refered to as a glacial tsunami before. The more common (and harder to spell and pronounce) name for this is 'Jokulhlaup.' You may also hear it called glacial outburst flooding. Do a search for the Missoula Floods - very interesting stuff there. I've seen and studied the damage these can cause and it's amazing. The Columbia River Gorge owes a lot of it's beauty to this flooding. The premise of Jokulhlaups is actual

Quote: Plucky - good luck with your secession. It is surely a novel concept that has never ever been advanced with utter failure before. I have enough trouble mustering the energy to organize my checkbook let alone a secession movement. I was j/k Quote: Someone whom "...finally got to watch a little TV when [he] was in Anchorage this weekend..." must really be in tune with reality. I'm not quite sure what you mean by that. I read a lot and keep up on the news via the internet, NPR and newspapers. My job also allows me some information from some pretty reliable sources, informatio

Sorry about that. I need to work on my aim. The inbreeding in Texas is also my bad. I was just trying to bake a cake, got some ingredients mixed up, said a couple of the wrong words and look what has come out of there recently! Maybe I should just give up on the Voodoo.

Gassan's definition of 'Summer' is pretty liberal. It is skiable most years in June and sometimes in July, but it isn't that great. May would kick ass there though! Beautiful views and a unique Japanese experience, however. Hakkoda in Aomori usually has skiable terrain until June also with some years stretching in to July. I've done it and it's not bad. Lots of hiking and climbing involved though! The tram at Hakkoda doesn't access a lot of the snow pockets that stick around so you have to search for them. Again, not truely a Summer ski area, but it and Gassan are the only thing

Awesome pics there DB! Thanks for posting those up! Man, I have to get to that part of the world one of these days. I am absolutely amazed by glaciers. I love them. I seek them out when I can. I actually lived and worked on the Juneau Icefield (Icefield being a large collection of glaciers similar to a small ice sheet but located in temperate, mountainous regions) for 3 months back in '99. I was finishing up my masters degree in glacial geomorphology and doing my research there. Personally, I've skied numerous glaciers and hope to ski a ton up here in Alaska. The Cascade Mount

I’m starting a movement to get Alaska to separate from the US and become its own country. That would rock. We’d keep our oil and make Georgie Boy look for some other pristine landscape to rape. I mean, the US is going to go down in flames if it isn’t able to fill 3% of its demand with north slope Alaskan oil. I’ve been performing some voodoo rituals in an attempt to harm Dubya. Nah, no broken arms or deadly diseases or blindness – just trying to curse him with genital warts. Look for him scratching his nether regions in the next press conference. I think it may be working.

Toque - That bowl is actually called Glacier Bowl. I'd probably classify it as a cirque glacier. I didn't see any pronounced bergschrunds, however. What you are seeing in the picture is called 'the high traverse' which accesses the lower parts of the bowl and some double blacks that aren't in the pic. Can't wait to ski in there next winter! SerreChe - unfortunately, my edges were not sharp! I beat the crap out of my skis in Whistler and never did get around to tuning them before I got to Alyeska. My knee was giving me fits also and I ended up damaging it some more. I thought things

Quote: Originally posted by grungy-gonads: What does "Salcha, AK" mean though? thanks! That's where I live - Salcha, Alaska.

I finally made it down to ski Alyeska. The conditions weren't all that great, but the weather was spectacular. It was pretty icy most of the day but softened up around 3pm. This is a shot up in to the bowl from the parking lot. The tops of those peaks are only 3,990 feet but the parking lot is only about 20 feet elevation. A shot of the headwall in the bowl. This was all closed due to avy danger. I think the very top is permanently closed. Another part of the bowl and headwall. Later in the day there were guys parasailing with skis on down this valley. It wa

Kintaro is right on the money there - I'll take it one step further though. The North Shore of Oahu has the largest collection of great breaks in the smallest area IN THE WORLD. There is a reason it is called the 'seven mile miracle.' Now, on the other hand, I've got a feeling that Alaska has the smallest collection of good breaks in the largest area I'll be checking out Yakutat for surf next month. The water temps are supposedly in the upper 40's in May! Woohoo!

Apparently, the guy receiving the beating has a bi-polar disorder and wasn't on his meds. I frequent a couple of surfing message boards and a couple of guys on there personally know the dude getting the beat-down. The whole situation was messy. ALL parties involved ended up being in the wrong. Watching the crowd/mob scene when things moved to the beach sickens me. It was one of the reasons on a long list of reasons that I got the hell off of Oahu and especially the north shore. It's a different vibe there. I never personally had problems with anyone, but I saw enough sh*t go down to

Quote: Originally posted by bobby12: Sideways = half decent, if a bit of a steal of Swingers and The Big Lebowski (which makes it sound much better than it actually is). Watch it if you are over 35. I totally agree. I watched this the other night and it wasn't bad, but I couldn't help but think of Swingers through the entire movie. Since I don't have any cable or TV reception where I live, I have been renting and buying a lot of movies lately. Most have been crap, but there have been some gems. Here's a partial lists GREAT MOVIES: Finding Neverland Garden State Hero Harold a

Last Rites are also read to someone in the hope that they will heal. The Pope was read last rites when he was shot in the gut in the 80's also. No, I'm not Catholic - I heard this on NPR (National Public Radio) which usually does a great job of reporting. The Pope is gone now. He did some great things in his time but also had some messed up views. Hopefully the church will get somebody a little more progressive this time RIP JP

SerreChe, I'll check on the heli skiing when I go to Alyeska. I actually just got off the phone with my friend down in Eagle River and it looks like it's set - I'm going down there to ski next Friday, Saturday and sunday Another place to check for heli skiing in AK would be Valdez. I still may try to do that in May but I need to get a little more info from a friend down there about it. I'll report what I find out. SkiGermany, Great information - thank you! Do you run that ski Germany site? That's a nice site with some good information on it. I was totally unaware

I haven't seen it, but I too think it was a bad idea from the start. The British version is a masterpiece for a sitcom and I don't see how it could be improved on. I do want to mention, however, that Steve Carell is one funny mofo. I really don't see him in this role though. The comedy is supposed to be understated when Carell is anything but. Oh well, I don't even have TV anyway. I was watching 'Finding Neverland' with Johnny Depp (great movie) the other night and did notice that 'Gareth' from the BBC version has a part as an usher at a theater. He looked totally different fr

SerreChe, I haven't skied Alyeska yet but am planning to the weekend after this. It's about a six hour drive for me or a 50 minute plane flight. A friend of mine from when I lived in Japan lives in Eagle River which is just outside Anchorage so I'll be going with him. From pictures he's sent me, it looks like a lot of fun. Tons of above tree line skiing, huge open faces and bowls and also good cruiser runs down below. I'm really looking forward to going! The 'resorts' around me aren't all that big but they do have some okay terrain. I'd compare them to Shimokura or Amihari resorts in Ja

SerreChe - Thanks for the information! I appreciate you taking the time to do this. It looks like there may be some options available. This is a great start for a list of places to check out though! Thanks again