journey_man

Mt Ruapehu is a bit of a special case because of the huge rocks - it needs about 1.6m to even operate! It is a lot better now than it was due to the use of snow cannons.

Originally Posted By: SirJibAlot that's a port-a-potty. There was construction going on at the time of the collapse, that was probably for the construction workers. Can you imagine being in there taking a mean crap when suddenly the bridge collapses! That would be one nasty dry cleaning bill! Ick! I much prefer the Doctor Who conspiracy theory!

Wow, the guy is a god!

Ouch!

and more on the crazy theme... I love the little white car that nearly gets wasted.

How to put some spring structure in the base of your skis... BTW I only use Firefox - works fine for me.

My flatmate is a live art actress and for one of her performances had to drew a number of pictures of people without ever looking at the resulting picture. I thought the pictures were very cool. My avatar, which sort of looks like me, is one of the pictures.

It is a small resort on the edge of Sapporo with a couple of interesting off piste areas. The easiest area is to the left and under the chair while the bowls off the cableway are more challenging and steeper. The further away bowls off the cableway are quite steep too. There are a couple of awesome drops hidden in there too. Awesome to watch others go off, I might add! If the snow's good you can easily do a couple of days there. It needs fresh snow to be fun, but gets good quantities when it does snow. It must be awesome in a "normal" year. It is the only time I've ever had a 100m section

Originally Posted By: SG <snip> Minnesota Bridge <snip> Just looking at the images from the link above and found this one: Correct me if I'm wrong - but doesn't that look like a blue Police Box sitting in the middle of the picture???

Originally Posted By: thursday Originally Posted By: Creek Boy skidaisuki, have you forgotten the mayor of Neeeseeikko is Australian? Jeeze, that is so untrue. You post it here and people will think it's gospel. Australian is the official language though. Right?

Originally Posted By: skidaisuki Journey Man - a nice guide for the uninitiated, but.... Originally Posted By: Journey Man I’m sure the transport companies hire consultants to ensure that none of their services match up with that of any other company. Anti collusion you might say. ...can't agree with that AT ALL. Expensive domestic travel may be, but the system is second to none in terms of integration, in my view. Not sure where you got the opposite impression from. Or is Hokkaido another country? I'm no expert on Japanese transport, so I'll accept that normally it's easy.

The ramen rocked - especially the crab ramen at Hanazono! We skied Hanazono just to have lunch... I'd have to agree that the Miso ramens in Hokkaido were great - they were hard to find elsewhere. CB - It wasn't all Niseko! I'm considering coming back to Japan for another season. I'd like to get a "proper" setup and do lot more BC this time.

Kamui has a good attitude towards their back country - it is roped off but it is only a warning. When you buy your tickets there is a map with areas marked in red where avi's have been known to occur - they figure you have been warned. If they know you are heading bc they will draw your attention to the map and discuss the current conditions with you. Kurodaki is in the same league as Asahidake in that they both are BC areas with lifts, but if the weather is dodgy you have the great run to do under the cable way - just get it right, where as in Asahidake you have the one course and to go

Talk to Clayton at the Black Diamond Lodge in Higashiyama as they do various tours. I helped them scope out some snowmobile BC tours last season. They also hire 4wd Delica vans, some with GPS systems. Clayton is a snow mad Canadian but has been living in Japan for yonks so can help you out with places to go in Hokkaido. God I sound like an ad. Must see about a bottle of whiskey...

News Flash! Heroes S2 launches in September both online and on air. BSG is kicking off again with a two hour special episode in November. There is a teaser available... There are some home made vids on the BSG site which are a bit of a laugh.

My god, that's tragic. It almost makes this season as bad as the last one was good!

Stoke Newington, London - is that exotic?

Least we forget... now I know why I hit all those Japanese trees!

If you are going to bother buying, you might as well get the DVD - then you'll get the whole deal - Hi Res video and 5.1 sound. Q. If I miss a show on TV, then download it so I can watch it, is it stealing? After all if I had been organised I could have recorded it on my computer through my TV dongle thingie... BTW most new DVD's will play computer DivX and XviD, etc video files. Saves on all that tedious converting!

I did my Avi course with Chuck and recommend him and I know that FT rates the Evergreen guys. Just to add my two cents, I think that even in a guided scenario you are safer if you know something about the terrain you are about to ride. Even the best guides can have an off day.

I like, very tasty.

Ok, hopefully the pictures are fixed now.

It took a while to happen, but here is a brief TR of my 2007 season in Japan. The pictures and their caption are not quite in the right place, but you get the idea. ============================================= Snow in Japan? “Surely not, don’t you mean the artificial ski slope they built”? One of the fun things I have found since my trip to Japan is how few people know that it snows in Japan, let alone has ski fields or mountains. It is amazing to think that it has the best powder in the world and almost nobody knows. Where to go? Typical Hokkaido snow –

Wow, that's nice!

Just joined up with Facebook and it's been a good experience so far. I got to choose who I wanted to be notified at each step. The photo tagging feature rocks. If someone tags you in one of their photos you get to know about it - you get to see photos of yourself (and others) that you didn't know existed. Also the ability to see members of the various groups and what friends people have has allowed me to find people I had lost track of.