From high peaks to coast

We decided to stay a bit longer in Tokachi-dake to keep on exploring some spots I haven't ski and enjoying the onsens.

The weather did get slightly better, but the sun was quite far from us!!!

There is a tiny bit less snow than around the same time last year, but still enough to enjoy most of the common runs

As we were cooking our fancy lunch/dinner featuring cheap scallops (8 huges for 2$!!!) at our car, Neil Hartmann and the guys from Car Danchi showed up in the same parking lot as we were! Those guys are filming snowboard movies and living in their cars!

They were up around Tokachi-dake area to film for their next movies.

After a day spend skiing around Fukiage Spa and trying a different run around Furano-dake, we catched up with the guys that were heading to a cabin to hang out for the night!

The invitation to not sleep in a car for a night sounds quite nice (for Amelie, it actually sounds like the best thing ever as the past nights have been quite cold!) We checked out some footage they took, drank sake and plum wine and ate a lot!

This really entertaining evening leads to a day spend with them looking how they actually shoot their movies. What a nice experience!! It was great to see how the pros are shooting, setting up the lines and lining up the shots! We again cut the day a bit short due to the cold temperature that froze both the cinematographer and the riders!

From Tokachi-dake we hitted the road west towards Sapporo.

Apparently, some storms have hitten the west part of the island while we were up at Tokachi-dake. From the snowbanks and everyone shovelling both their driveway and their roofs, it was a major one.

We finally scouted a nice open spot not so far from the road around Furubira (a tiny fisherman village west of Otaru) and decided to give it a go! Even if the snowbanks around town were giants, the snowpack was rather shallow and weak.

 

 We play it safe and made it to the car skiing! 

Don't have to tell you we had some weird looking by the locals as we were skiing down the streets!!!

We woked up and went to buy breakfast at the groceries. We had one of the biggest surprise of our trip when we spot 2 guys walking off from the beach with.... SURF BOARDS!!! Guess some like it cold! I do have to agree that the waves looked rather big.

The high point of the road 998A has been recommended by Neil. As we drove up, we found some awesome backcountry. There is some steep lines, trees and probably some car shuttle runs to be done up there. This is probably my nicest discovery of the trip! Since we were (again) in some kind of blizzard, we didn't venture too far off.  We lined up some turns not too far from the car and had a few laps. This is an area I will for sure explore more sometimes!!!

We just got to Niseko to get some good backcountry runs and some slackcountry before going back home (sniff, sniff!!!!). It has average about 20 cm per day for the last 10 days, so it looks quite promising! At the time of writing, it is PUKING outside!

evans

Snowy snowland of Hokkaido!

The snow just kept on falling in Niseko!

More than 2m (6 feet) of snow as hitted the resort over the past week.

But even if it was puking, we made the hard (and a bit weird) decision to leave Niseko to explore new venues on Hokkaido. 

One range of mountain located in the southeast of the island with peak nearly as high as the one in the Daisetsuzan National park (park that features most of the highest mountain on Hokkaido) as gotten my attention. From the topographical map and by the view I was able to get on Google Earth, it was looking promising. 

So we took off to get a look at it! After about a day of driving, we were able to get our first view of the mountains.

Unfortunately, the closest we were from the mountain, the less skiable they looked. The high peaks seemed to present some decent lines, but the access would required a lot of hiking and bushwhacking. To top it off, there wasn't much snow on the ground next to the road… And by not much snow, I mean less than a foot. I guess I have to call it a big FAIL!

Nevertheless, this drive brought us back to Nissho Pass, where we scouted some really skiable terrain last year on a day off. We decided to give it a go! We drove up to the pass into some stormy weather. We dressed up and made our way up! 

It was really cold!!!

One of the coldest I have been in a long time hiking up! It was really windy but we found some nice sheltered snow to make our way down! Happy birthday to me!!!

The storm just get worst at the end of the day and being in such an exposed spot, we figured it would not be so skier-friendly the following day. 

After an evening spend eating Okonomiaki and Takoyaki and sipping warm sake, We went back to a sure spot: Tokachi-dake!

The snowbanks from the parking lot gave us the assurance that there was enough snow to get a good day. The weather even cleared out a bit leaving us the impression that we even get some sunshine!

We were sooooooo wrong! Soon after we started skinning up, the clouds move back and the wind picked up! Amelie did get very cold and even with two down jackets on and a stop half way down to warm her feet up, there was nothing else to do than to rush down back to the car!

So the forecast for the followings days are mostly snow, snow and snow. This is one of the best snow-strike I have seen on Hokkaido of my 3 travels here!

We might head back near Niseko to explore some new backcountry spots if it ever stop to snow!

evans

Snow was waiting for us!

We finally got our car. And what a car it is! I always dreamt about driving a Delica, but I have honestly never thought about driving such a pimp one! Some work was done to build a bed in and we are now all set to hit the road!!!

Before leaving our cozy little cabin, we invited JS L'Heureux, an expat from Quebec working this winter as a lead guide for Black Diamond Tours for some homemade Okonomiaki, our favorite typical dish.

With not much new snow and not being much a groomer fan, we headed out to Mt. Shiribetsu close to Niseko for a backcountry run. Even if the snow on the ground was not able to cover all the 'Sassa' (the green leaves sticking out of the ground), we were still able to get some really nice turns in! The bottom was rather soft and we had about a foot of fresh on top!

Some new snow brought us back to the resort hoping to get some decent turns! The 20cm that fell overnight certainly soften up the conditions, but I was really hoping for more!

We went to the backside of Annuupuri (Mountain on which Niseko resorts are located) for a run I have never done. After putting our skins on in the backcountry in some kinds of stormy weather, we started skinning up. The weather just get worst and worst. Since a fatality happen 2 days ago around the area we were skiing and a little slab was forming as we were getting higher, we stopped our ascension short from the summit. Nevertheless, we still got some really nice deep and soft turns.

On our first night sleeping in the van, as usually, we had slightly opened the windows. The following morning brought us a storm inside the van!!!

After 20 minutes of cleaning inside, we stepped out of the van and realized there was about 1.5 feet of fresh on the ground! We, as you can certainly imagine, rushed ourselves to Niseko to hit this massive storm that was still in full effect!

We rode inbounds and were able to get steady faceshots runs after runs! We skied until 16h30 in a storm that was continuously filling up our tracks!

We were quite glad to have been able to ski this storm that was easing up!

After spending the night in a closed window van, we woked up with a foot of new overnight snow on the ground. The no brainer was to go back to the hill as it was snowing at about 10cm an hour in some points! We tried Niseko Hirafu as a stomping ground for this storm. The first few runs were nice with not many people on the slopes. It soon began to be crowded. The base of Niseko Hirafu is the closest to much of the bars and the accommodation avalaible, it for sure attracts the tourist! The peak gates remained closed all day and we ski the glades that didn't get too much tracked. In fact, we were able to get some really nice deep and soft turns again all day.

At the time of writing, it is still snowing out there and it looks again promising for tomorrow!

From Niseko, your powder reporter!
evans