JAPAN GRABS - Hakuba 2014-2015 : A Season Exploring the Japanese Alps
wow, i seriously don’t know if i can wait till Feb…
Last week saw crazy amounts of snow falling on Hakuba followed by a sunny bluebird day on Friday. Hearing from those who rode, Friday had been ‘The Day’. A strategic sick day would have been a good call, but those are always a gamble. Oh well. So we were left with Saturday and it’s forecasted warm temps and .....rain!
Luckily, the warm temps didn’t really show up and the rain turned out to be snow in the afternoon. We made the best of it by hunting for sidehits on the Happo One cat tracks, and even found a little powder in the corners.
I really didn’t expect to get any useable media as it was grey, flat light-ish and snowing. Pretty miserable conditions unless you’re snowboarding and having fun.
-Marc
method
handplant
Powder spray
Note to self: Getting sprayed ‘to get the shot’ is not always a good idea
Hey guys, make sure you check out Almo Films’ ‘No One Knows’ full movie here:
https://www.boardworld.com.au/forums/viewthread/18044
The Japan section features riding in Hakuba and Myoko when they came last year. I made the final cut and show up for a second here and there - but that’s not why you should watch it. The riding is pretty bad ass and the production values are top notch.
-Marc
What minute are you on Marc?
8:53 to 9:08 is the main bit. They slept over at my in-laws house.
I thought the shots are of your riding haha but looks like a nice, mellow crew there. Have you ridden your rider’s choice in deep pow yet Marc?
Pretty miserable conditions unless you’re snowboarding and having fun.
Haha, I love this quote. Such true words.
Thanks for the update, Marc!
We’re running a bit behind with the updates: Remember this pic?
Here’s the report from a resort non-opening just 30 minutes from my house.
The weekend didn’t start so well as the local resort announced that it wasn’t going to open on Saturday as planned, and Sunday was going to be the opening day. What the ....? I should have gone to Hakuba! I had specifically stayed home for this!
Then, I started hearing reports and seeing photos of ‘the deepest day’ at Happo that I was missing!!! Grrr! So that afternoon, determined not to waste a day, I grabbed my 148 Spliff splitboard and headed up to the local.
It was tough going as I was having to break trail all the way up. I have never had to to it in knee deep pow and it took a while before I figured out a good system. Mind you, when I say knee deep, that’s knee deep on split skis/board. When I did my transition to splitboard I sank in to my waist!
It was hard work but so nice to be outside, and the snow was light and fluffy….and did I say, deep? All the way up I had visions of doing three laps of the top section before heading down, but as I ran out of time and the weather socked in and turned more blizzardy, I turned around.
Check out the ride down!
-Marc
Ahh man, so good. Your photos have me frothing to ride deep powder. I scratched the itch last weekend but it’s nothing compared to what you guys have been getting in Hakuba. I hope you and Andrew both had a great Christmas. Looking forward to what’s in store in 2015.
The day before yesterday, Andrew and I met up for a day at Cortina Kokusai, near Hakuba. The morning report said 20cm of fresh at the top so I thought we might avoid the big crowds heading for the big resorts with bigger snowfall reports. Well, it wasn’t crowded so that was good, but the snow wasn’t that great. We only did three runs in the morning and went in for an early lunch. I honestly thought the day was going to be a write-off at that point.
After a lazy-long lunch, we set out to charge our mojo by exchanging boards. Although both were Lib Tech La Nina’s, we both had to ride them switch (Andrew is goofy & I’m regular-footed). Boom! All of a sudden we were back to being spastic beginners trying to get on the lift. It is seriously hard but always a good laugh watching the other guy. We dropped straight away into the trees and those toe-side turns were a refreshing change of pace, cranking up the danger level quite a few notches.
Coming out of the trees, after some ridiculous side hit attempts, we gratefully switched boards back.
And with that, we had a new eagerness to find something rad. We went exploring and stumbled on two kamoshika. They were running through a creek bed and I somehow got in between the two - a mother and child. Not the smartest thing to do but I managed to pull out onto higher ground, and the beasts were able to go on their way around me. It was quite exciting in a ‘running of the bulls’ sort of way. I’ll have that video for you soon.
In the meantime, check out this footage of our second run, to see what a bad day at Cortina looks like 
-Marc
Ps. And of course the next day it was puking and people’s tracks were resetting each run!
Sick runnn
Incredible. I feel sorry for you guys. 
While in Point Break they had the 100-year storm, over the New Year’s break in Hakuba, we had to settle with a mere 10-year one. Not that we were complaining as it meant lots of powder every day. Andrew and I hit it big with an epic day at Cortina last Saturday.
It was a typical start to the day - big crowds and long lineups for the top lift. Only getting three runs before lunch would seem like a downer, but they were all of primo quality. As the day wore on, our perseverance paid off as the queues got shorter and our run count went up faster. We were getting line after line of deep snow and we couldn’t believe our luck when we were still getting fresh faceshots when the top lifts stopped at 4pm. We finished the day with some dorking around til 5. After that, we hit the onsen in the hotel, which is one of my favourites. If you go there, make sure you don’t miss the waterfall massages in the outdoor bath! They are a great way to reset your body for the next day of shredding.
The following vid was one of my best runs from that day. I dropped in and threw down a stiff heelside slasher, but then had to come back quickly to my right as there were trees down the fall line. As I came on my toes, I entered a powder cloud that shouldn’t have been there. I was seriously wondering where it had come from! It was when I started getting hit with chunks of snow from my right that I realized that I was getting tubed from my first slash! Getting pitted, so pitted, brah! I burst out of the cloud and saw a lip which I aired off, then I saw that the ground had fallen away and I was going to land in a mini-halfpipe. I had a moment of panic til I saw that the exit was clear (I had visions of getting wrapped around a tree), then stomped the landing and hooted.
Hahaha, that was awesome Marc! Send us some snow please
Super jealous.
Half tempted to pack my bags, sell my truck and do the rest of the season in Japow!