journey_man

I mean to say, they're both awesome. But one must be better - there can be only one... You can blame FT, he put me on to Heroes The thing is, I can't make up my mind.

BA lost my bags as well. Got them back after a few dayz. They are as bad as Air Canada. Maybe worse - at least I've never had to fly Air Canada long haul. My long haul experience with BA the crew were ugly and unhelpful and there was so little seat room my knees were firmly pressed into the seat in front of me - and I'm not that tall at 5'11". Never again.

He does have a point though...

That's a lot of bongs to get through...

Awesome! I'm going to be in London soon. I wonder if they'll have the escalators roped off and how nazi patrol will be...

Yeah, I wanna know too. Well sort of...

Here's another one: Air Canada: Swamp Donkeys R Us Air Canada is equal last place with BA for my worst airlines to fly with. I have one to add to my best of list of Cathay Pacific and Singapore Air - ANA, not quite up the same standard, but streets ahead of most.

Maybe you could take a vote - not many threads are even vaguely still on topic after a bunch of pages. I have a big email heading your way as well. Just got to finish it (ok, I forgot about it...)

Hey Indosnm, where did yours come from??? Not allowed to get all coy and mysterious here...

I was wondering how everyone came up with their nicknames. Some I know about like Fattwins and Slow. Others really make you wonder! Like Bush Pig, eskimobasecamp and Thursday... Care to share? I'll start, Journey Man is because since 1992 I have been travelling most of the time.

Actually a "Where to ski" forum is a great idea. Closing threads such as "Snow in Japan" after they get huge is probably a good idea too. I know this thread hammers the hell out of your servers and by now it should be renamed "A bit of everything". It doesn't help people trying to find information when they find a thread with 400 odd pages!

If you're into a bit of BC then the dake's around Asakikawa still have great winter snow. A week ago anyways.

Sounds like a good plan! I'm looking forward to next season already...

Lol, they're still trying to do it. Here is a message that was plastered all over Higashiyama a couple of weeks ago: Yu no Sawa is such good riding too -allegedly

Who said don't go to Hokkaido??? Shame on you! (God, I'm sounding like Thursday...) If you have the time and money I'd definitely visit Hokkaido. Apart from Niseko, it is totally uncrowded. Even then Happo One in Hakuba is buisier on a weekend than Hirafu in Niseko. I rode Kurodake a week ago and our party was the only one on the mountain. The only tracks we could complain about were our own... The BC around Asahikawa is fantastic and the snow is amazing, not to mention relatively stable. If you're only interested in terrain with the big lines then Hakuba (flag that, go to the rockie

Not telling, too scared to add it all up... And now I have this developing BC addiction and it is looking like costing mega bucks. I've got the basics, but I want more... Bigger pack, avalung, AT bindings, AT boots, skins, snow saw and those flash telescopic poles. It never ends...

Loud powder!

I just did a RAC through Backcountry Powder Tracks [info@b-powdertracks.com] based out of Furano - but they do courses where ever they're needed in Hokkaido (read Niseko). I really enjoyed the course and rate the instructor, Chuck. He has every qualification that I've heard of (mainly Canadian) and is a HeliSki guide out of Methven (NZ) in the off season. Plus we found some awesome snow to do some "high speed" analysis on in both Kamui and Furanodaki...

There are some pictures, but they're spread over a number of cameras, so it will take a while to collect them all. I'm planning to do a TR on Asahikawa, so hopefully they'll appear there. If I get inspired I may even do a TR on Japan!

My season is now over and I got in 50 days. Would have been more if I'd been prepared to pay for skiing on hardpack pistes. Which means most of the 50 were pow days! I call that a great season!

I bailed from Niseko a couple of weeks ago to go and do an avi course at Kamui and Furanodake. Had a great time and stayed! There are bunch of really cool people in Asahikawa, not to mention all the various amazing "dakes". When I go back to Hokkaido I wont be based in Niseko... So I don't know what is happening in Niseko - but it was "variable" when I was there. For a while there was nothing, thanks to a couple of very hot days. The only place that was slushy out of Asahikawa was Kamui (and only on some slopes) - which is now closed. Everywhere else was still getting great snow. Kurodak

EBC, glad to see you finally got Photoshop sorted! It looked like it was going to be a battle... I've been offline for a couple of weeks so have missed all the fun, have you got any other cool doctored photos?

Excellent - it's good to see that the season isn't dead yet! I wish it had happened while I was down there! Oh well, next time...

I think that early January was better, however I'm not complaining. This snow is great! With more to come too!

Definitely