XilR8

No-brainer. Powder in the trees.

Originally Posted By: thursday no people, it's called plastic..... What does Niseko use, Thursday? On Honshu most resorts are using paper paper. As in, when I tried to exchange my 3-day lift ticket for a free onsen pass, it was so sodden that it disintegrated when I tried to remove it from the pass holder.

All the people who stole other people's snowboards must have been gaijin I know that would be the case with mine because no Japanese feet would fit in!

Kagura has decent terrain, probably the best chance of powder in Yuzawa, and relaxed patrol. 30-40 minutes shuttle bus from Yuzawa station.

Ah, the good old Eurocarve. I'm pretty sure that's a board they have specially made for those carves. I'm working on getting mine down there slowly though

I have a business trip to Ina coming up and was wondering whether there are any ski-jo nearby? I know there used to be one at Ina itself, but as far as I can tell, it's closed. Any Nagano people here able to point me in the right direction? Cheers!

Haneda is basically on an island stuck out in Tokyo bay. No real drinking options out there. You'd have to come into Tokyo proper, maybe leave your luggage at the station, then hit the town.

Snowjapan's info page lists Hachimantai as "Resort Closed". Have they gone the way of Arai? If so, any chance of them ever reopening? What about Arai? Sorry for a bit of a mishmash of questions, but I didn't think they quite deserved separate threads.

Yes, been in Foot a couple of times over the last few years when miscommunication resulted in some Aussie customers getting unnecessarily heated over an order that wasn't quite what they wanted. Things should be easier now that they have a Filipino barmaid though

This should be a pinned topic. That's great info.

True. Took my Fish out in some really deep powder for the first time over the weekend, the float is incredible!!

Originally Posted By: panhead_pete Been out again, focussing on putting lots of wieght on my front foot as the instructors I have had previously said I was surfing too much..... Great fun. Scrap that training asap. You'll want all your weight on the back foot or you will be drowning in powder here

I did a bit of a search, and found the 2 reviews you mentioned that said the place is awful. One dated December 2008, one January 2008. On the other hand, pretty much all the websites that reference this place describe it along these lines: "Centrally Located in Hakuba only 3 minutes to the ski lifts and local nightlife. A clean and comfortable western style lodge." "Located only 250 metres to the Happo One ski lifts...Wind Jacket provides reasonable rates for a premier location." "Wind Jacket has been newly renovated." I'd say if that wasn't the case then you would have

Absolute classic! Nice pictures, Cheeseman.

Calling all you waxers out there What wax do you generally use? Do you just go with the "universal" wax or do you try and use a temperature-specific was (yellow, red, blue)? If you use the temperature-specific wax, how do you decide which one to use? Do you look at the weather forecast? If I understand it right, it's the temperature of the snow, not the temperature of the air that is the relevant factor. How would you know that without going out there and sticking a thermometer into the snow? The reason I ask is sometimes I feel like my wax is giving me a "braking effect" rather than

Thought as much. It's 5,500 one way or 10,500 return. Bus leaves Nagoya at 22.40 and arrives in Hakuba Goryu at 6:05am. http://www.travex.co.jp/businfo/nagoya/hakuba.html

13000 yen? That seems a bit steep. You could get a bus halfway across Japan for that price.

There were some epic days there over new year with all the fresh snow. Surprisingly few people hitting the lines under the lifts etc too.

Just accost some dudes at the station and share the fee for a taxi. Always works for me at Yuzawa, and I'm at Kagura well before the chumps who waited for the bus

Powder board for sure. If it dumps, you'll be laughing, if it doesn't, you'll still have a good time. On the other hand, if you take the small board and it dumps, you'll drown, so you're cutting your chances.

Also, a danger of wearing a helmet is that it gives the wearer a false sense of security. "I'm wearing a helmet so I can't be damaged" feeling, meaning that they take more risks than they would do without a helmet, despite the fact that the helmet itself only offers limited additional protection.

Originally Posted By: Nisoko You do know that it's Hokkaido, right? You do know that it's Niseko, right?

No reason to have sharp tip and tail unless you like catching edges...

Lol, I was balls-deep in powder in some parts of Kagura on Saturday! Is that, or Hakuba, far from you?

Thanks SJ4. You guys are awesome.