Back in Hawaii. My connection in NGO was a little tight. No sooner had I disembarked the plane from CTS and gotten out my next boarding pass to check the boarding time that I discovered that there were only 30-minutes to get through security and exit immigration and make it to the gate. Luckily boarding was running late, so I had a little tim to get my stuff in order gateside after unwearing the thermal baselayers in the bathroom. Didn’t have any time to buy anything in NGO, but as it was after 21:00, everything was long closed anyway… wouldn’t have minded a bath though.
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Mostly packed up now. Off to look for some odds and ends like pen refills, 6mm tubing, and 2100 milliamp/hour NiMH AA batteries…
(0)You know it’s going to be a good snow day when you have to use the bootpack just to get from the ticket window to the gondola base!
I caught the first bus to Sapporo Kokusai on Monday to get a last riding day in before leaving. The bus lady said that if the resort was closed, the bus would return to Sapporo – after all, it was so early that the employees probably hadn’t shown up at the resort yet, so there was no way to check this early. Everyone was apparently sleeping in late, as I had the entire bus to myself on the drive over. Still, the bus lady got on the PA for the announcements: She could have just come over and told me directly… Continue reading ‘Choke-tastic’
You either have to stay the whole season or be really lucky to get an awesome powder day in Niseko. When I got there on Friday, the snow was falling heavily, but the high winds that are typically associated with the storms that bring in the snow closed the resorts for the day. The winds were nowhere near as bad as the time I was there several years ago and got blocked on my last riding day, so at least the snow was accumulating instead of blowing away to cover the surrounding farming plain. Continue reading ‘Typical Niseko’
Of course, having the word “desert” in the name is a dead giveaway that the Danner Desert Acadia GTX boots were not originally designed for snow use, but the Gore-Tex liner kept my feet dry and warm with just regular mid-weight wool hiking socks in -10C weather. My feet were warm even standing for extended peroids of time in deep snow. The Vibram Sierra sole worked fine in loose snow and on packed snow, but on freshly snowplowed roads where the black ice had been exposed, they were crazy slippery. Granted it’s ice, but my Danner 453 hikers actually had more traction on the same surface. I’m not going to even get into whether siping the sole blocks like snow tires or using a harder/softer compound would make them work better in a winter environment. I’ll be looking into whether Lowa or someone else makes a snow/ice Gore-Tex boot. Continue reading ‘Slippery Boots of Death’
OK, it’s been a month and I figure I should talk about some of the stuff from our latest Salt Lake City, Utah snow trip. Guess I should start off with this image. What’s going on here? It’s for what we have come to call the MJ gloves.
Seirus Therma-Lux Heat Pocket Liner Gloves
For years I’ve been using a pair of polypro stretch gloves I picked up at a convenience store in Japan under my main snowboarding gloves. Reason being is that I often have to take off gloves to work my camera gear, but without any type of covering the hands quickly get frozen. Liners that come with gloves are warm, but too bulky and/or too loose fitting so don’t stay on hands. My Japan liners started to get a bit ratty with holes starting to appear, so I got a pair of USA made wool stretch gloves that work well too. On our latest trip spotted these liners in REI. Yes, the universal intial reaction was, “oooo, shiny!” This model was touted as this companies warmest, with the metalized gold fibers woven in supposedly spreading and reflecting warmth back to the user. It features a pocket on the back of the hand to slip a chemical hand warmer pad too. Continue reading ‘SLC Reviews & Dirt Bag Tips’
Okay, landed fine. The pilot clarified that the level of snowfall in itself wasn’t preventing operations at the airfield, but cloud cover and visibility might make him abort landing. Visibility was fine, and turbulence actually not bad. THe runway was a bit rough from the compacted snow, but other than that, the landing went off without a hitch. Hooray!
(0)Whoa! The ANA flight to CTS before my JAL flight was cancelled “due to snow”! Oh krapp! OK, JAL is only saying that they will take off and return to NGO or reroute to HND only if they can’t land due to the immediate conditions.
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