Go Native

Huh? I have no relatives in Japan. I do know all the guys who were interviewed though.

They got one thing right though. Nearly everyone I spoke to on my recent trip there said this season was the best they'd ever had. Niseko is certainly not losing it's popularity with the mass market.

Wasn't there an Air France plane that went down a few years back over the Atlantic and it took them around 2 years to find and recover the black box? And from what I remember they had far more concrete data on where it went down. It could certainly be a long time before they find this plane.

Been past there so many times but never skied it. Definitely nice views.

Some years back a group of guys from Niseko went to Kurodake. They climbed the peak and then on the way down lost their way a bit and couldn't find a route through the cliff lines. They ended up spending a whole night out without much more than what they had on. They found a way out the next day but that was one cold night they spent huddled together. Luckily the weather was fine.

Our business is up 40% on the previous year so yeah I'll probably have a little extra money to play with.

Head off the peak or through gate 4 into Fujiwara no Sawa bowl. You should find better snow on that side of the mountain.

The longer it takes to learn what actually happened the more grandiose the conspiracy theories will become.

So Mike when are you going to make an honest women of Nery's? Surely she's a keeper?

I would suggest Asahidake over Kurodake if you were to choose one place. There's far more accessible terrain around Asahidake than over at Kurodake. Tokacchidake though would be the best of them all I reckon. Lots of great touring there.

Are you just going a little off-piste or do you intend on really heading out into the side/backcountry? If you're heading out then a beacon, probe and shovel are a must I'd think. If things turn to whiteout whilst you're out beyond the resort (hardly uncommon up on Hakkoda) a GPS and/or map and compass would be very handy (and of course know how to use them). Obviously something to drink and eat and an extra fleece or something similar to help keep warm if you do find yourself stranded for some reason. I find my normal gloves can get quite sweaty if I'm exerting myself going uphill so I like

Snowing quite heavily in Niseko this evening.

That photo of mine seemore is originally in colour and I just used the editing software on flickr to change it to b&w. Using a better editor would get a better result.

Today was surprisingly good. Had up to knee deep turns on the slopes below the cornice on Higashi-one ridge.

I've got this one

One of my favourites too sand.

At this stage JMA are predicting it to warm up over the next week but still looking at it getting colder than normal in March. I wouldn't say winter is over just yet.

We didn't even have any aircon in our house in Hokkaido (most don't). There were a few occasions when it would have been nice but a fan was sufficient.

For the 7 years we were in Japan I only ever went back to Australia once for a funeral (otherwise I'd have never gone back) and my mum came over to visit once. So didn't see her much in all those years. My wife's parents came over every year for a visit and my wife went back to Australia 4 or 5 times whilst we were away.

I took a pencil but of course I can't really read or write any kanji and my Japanese wasn't great. No one seemed to care. No one took notes. As I say half the class actually appeared to go to sleep during the movie. And the safety stuff in the movie was the most basic crap. Anyway at the end they signed the paperwork I needed to get my license renewal and that was that.

I had to do the lecture thing because I'd got done for doing more than 30km over the speed limit. It was really boring and useless and during a safety movie they showed us about half the class appeared to fall asleep. There was no group work or any sort of test or anything.

We voted in Abbott.

All the things you need for a great holiday....and more!!

Yeah the ice age that snowdude keeps telling us about obviously hasn't hit that part of the world yet.