Shan in Japan

Welcome 2007

noreply@blogspirit.com (Shan) — Tue, 02 Jan 2007 15:05:00 +0900

新年明けましておめでとうございます！
Happy New Year!

Firstly, I'd just like to say a few words about my awesome trip to Hokkaido.
On Christmas day I landed in the snow country of Asahikawa. I was greeted to clear blue skies and 10cm of fresh snow the following morning. I spent most of the morning blasting down the fast corduroy groomers until my legs were spent. Stayed in Furano area at the convenient Alpine backpackers located just 5mins from the gondola. Furano has a nice vibe about the place. The backpackers was very quiet and I think I was the only person staying there for the first few nights. I was in bed by 9pm for the first few nights getting a solid 10 hours sleep. Alas, unusual warm weather brought rain the next day. It managed to turn into wet heavy snow by late afternoon, but cancelled any hopes of plowing the powder. I missed out on 'classic' Hokkaido conditions, but still it was great to be out of Tokyo for a bit.

Met some of the local lads and few of the foreigners living there. I also got off the resort a few days, donned the avvy gear and skinned up Mt. Tokachidake with Chuck from Backcountry Powder Tracks. I thought I was fairy fit, but after 4 hours of hiking on skis, I had hardly any gas left in the tank to put in solid turns on the descent. The snow was deep but really heavy. It was the first time I had skied this kind of snow with telemark skis and really struggled. The highlight was skiing through the trees and stopping to listen to absolutely nothing in a beautiful sleeping world of whiteness. To top it off, we stopped at a free onsen on the way back. It was just a few rock pools nestled in the side of a valley surrounded by snow laden trees. After stripping off in the -10 degrees air, I was stuck between being freezing in the outside air and the onsen water being too hot to get in!

I explored another resort called Kamui Ski Links. Its about an hour from Furano and a fantastic ski area. The owner of the resort has a son who is a big mountain extreme skier, so he understands the desire for many skiers who want to ski off-piste. You can ski anywhere here and there are 'no out of bounds' signs at all. I spent the day fine tuning my telemark turns under the guidance of Nori, a telemarker with 10 years experience. On the final day I awoke to 15cm of new dry powder snow. With an early afternoon flight, I was first on the gondola line and got as many runs in as I could before running after the airport bus at 10.30am. It continues to dump several days later as I write this. So 8 out of 10 for Furano. It would surely deserve a 10 had I timed it a bit better, but it offers better snow quality than anywhere else in Japan at this early stage of the season.

So with my Hokkaido trip at a close, I arrived in Tokyo on late afternoon December 31st. Dashed home to dump my gear and catch the train out to Kori to meet up with Brad on the New Years Eve hike. After about a dozen of us gathered at his place for a countdown toast, we made our way up to Mitake Shrine. After a 2 hour hike we replenished ourselves with some hot soba noodles and paid our respects at the shrine. Though there was no snow, the temperatures felt not too disimilar to Hokkaido. Interesting to see ice flowers that are caused by moisture slowly seeping out from the stems of dead plants (from the summer) and forming intricate ice crystals. see the photo.

We made our way to Hinodeyama to wait for the first sunrise of 2007. Except for the champagne toast, I had a completely alcohol free new years eve. Hopefully this is the beginning of a trend to lower my alcohol consumption this year! The view from the top of the mountain looked out over the entire megalopolis of Tokyo, from Yokohama to the Chiba. It blows you away to see the pulsating city of lights with 25 million residents spread out below. As the sun brightened the horizon, the lights faded away and the orange disc rose to shed its warmth. There were hundreds of people gathering here. People were clapping, yelling 'banzai' and overall pretty stoked to welcome in the new year despite the freezing temperatures.

With little sleep, I soaked in a hot bath near the temple and took the easy way down on the cable car. I spent the first day with my host parents and all the extended family. New years day is much like christmas day, except with less stress involved with exchanging presents. Its just about all getting together, relaxing, eating, drinking and talking. A time to shed all worries and hit the reset button for the new year. I was really tired by the time I made it back to my apartment, with only a few hours sleep out of the last 36 hours.

I feel good about this year and hope all my friends and family have a great 2007 too. Peace and Love to you all!

Christmas 2006

noreply@blogspirit.com (Shan) — Mon, 25 Dec 2006 11:43:34 +0900

Seasons Greetings!
Just a few more days left of 2006. Very excited as I am about to fly up to Hokkaido this afternoon for a week in the snow. Spent Christmas Eve in Roppongi Hills with a glass of champagne in hand looking out over the amazing nightscape of Tokyo. Checked out Bill Violas exhibition of video art - images of Life, Death and the Future. Very 'slap in the face' stuff. No roast ham or chicken, but instead devoured a Peking duck washed down with jasmine tea.

Cheers to you all!

The beginning

noreply@blogspirit.com (Shan) — Mon, 27 Nov 2006 00:45:00 +0900

It's been nearly 2 years since I've seen and touched the stuff. It's white, cold and great to slide on - it's snow I'm talking about! First news of nearby resort Kagura opening up with real natural snow got my attention immediately and I was on the early morning Shinkansen out to Yuzawa. Met up with the guys who run www.welovesnow.com there, and headed for the gondola. It seemed a bit strange not seeing any snow around at the bottom of the gondola. I was looking at the autumn leaves still in bright firey colours as we ascended, but at the top snow become more and more visible. There was only one run open and big crowds, but it was great to be out there. Weather was primo and I was skiing in my t-shirt - spring skiing conditions. Snow was not very deep and grass patches started to poke through as the afternoon sun warmed up. I was on my telemark skis and took a few runs to find my legs. By the time I found my legs and began connecting some turns, I was knackered. Finished the day with beers, onsen and yakiniku. Just the way it should be. This is just the beginning

Halloween

noreply@blogspirit.com (Shan) — Wed, 01 Nov 2006 12:59:01 +0900

Halloween was just a time for 'trick or treat' when I was a kid and stocking up on lollies. Never really a big thing growing up in NZ. Japan is the same - a few token decorations here and there. Jack Lanterns and a few Witches about. Well so I thought.

I went to the "Glitter Ball" which was more like a halloween cum S&M party. I was dressed as Catholic priest and had all kinds of naughty people accosting me and confessing their sins! With all-you-can-drink booze flowing, there were quite a few unstable monsters and vampires staggering around by the end of the night. I ended up losing my crucifix and unable to fend them away. Staggered home in the early hours of the morning..of course I was an Irish priest:-)

Winter please

noreply@blogspirit.com (Shan) — Sat, 21 Oct 2006 11:47:28 +0900

After an endless summer, I am looking forward to the chilly season. Main reason is the snow - jumping on the skis and board again.
I went to the opening of the Burton Snowboards store in Harajuku last weekend. All the pro snowboarders, Terje, Shaun, Kelly etc were there. Jake Burton the man himself made an appearance. Good thing about working for a magazine is that you get press passes anywhere. Even though I'm no journalist/photographer!
Ended up being quite a late one that evening. All this talk prompted me to pull out my gear and see what I need to do for this season. Heated up the iron to put on some wax, but couldn't find the wax.....
Set to go on a backcountry tour with the North Face crew in late November for a pre-season slide. My chicken legs need a bit of work, especially around the knees for riding telemark skis, so been getting into the gym most mornings doing squats. Feeling all the better for it already!

Awesome Autumn

noreply@blogspirit.com (Shan) — Mon, 09 Oct 2006 18:25:00 +0900

No more sweaty nights and mugginess~! Just had a typhoon roll by last week and give the atmosphere a good clean out. 3 day weekend has seen some of the clearest blue skies over Tokyo in a long time. Did a solo mission out to Okutama today. Bagged up the bike and caught the train this morning. Picked some trails that were closed off to the public as there were many hikers out today. Nothing worse than blasting around a corner and nearly giving some elderly weekend hiker a heart attack!
Just got back in to Tokyo and feel totally revived. Always amazes me this natural environment is only a 90min train ride away from my house. Great to even out the urban / rural balance.
Also, the Minakami Full Moon party was on again this weekend. Wanted to go, but no others available to revel with this time. Bummer, as this is the last one for the year. Will be making the most of this cool weather and getting out on the trails as much as possible - especially with the autumn leaves changing colour.

Full Moon Party

noreply@blogspirit.com (Shan) — Sun, 10 Sep 2006 21:40:00 +0900

Escaped from Tokyo on saturday to check out a full moon party in Minakami, Gunma. Just a few hours on the Kanetsu expressway and I was in the mountains of an emerging adventure capital in Japan. There are 11 outdoor companies here doing rafting, bungy jumping, canyoning and a host of other cool stuff. Partly the reason of coming out here was to say gday to some of these guys who support outdoorjapan.com, but the main reason was just to get out party!

Good mate Kazu picked me up on saturday arvo after a late start due to a slightly excessive friday night. Threw the tent and some munchies into the back of the car, cranked some sounds and hit the expressway. When we arrived, I met a fellow kiwi running one of the outdoor companies and also the main event organizer of the full moon party. Big lad with big dreads - got himself a very cool business set up. Got some inside info on where to set up camp and also very importantly, the onsen location. Soaked in the onsen and let the last dregs of friday night escape through the pores, then headed up into the misty hills to find the party location. Nestled in the valley alongside a river, there were two stages set up with all the techno, trippy paraphernalia you would expect at a full moon party. We befriended our neighboring campers and indulged on their fine umeboshi sour plums, which we cooled off with a Bombay Sapphire on the rocks. Around 10pm the big sounds started reverberating up the valley, which prompted us to put on our party faces and roll on down. Even at this early hour there was a good crowd converging. Good mix of foreigners and Japanese. Good dose of long and hairies - the new hippy culture. And no outdoor party goes without the firestarters swinging there poi pois. Everything was in fine balance. Just the right amount of people, not too crowded. Music was great - mix of reggae, lounge and latin down on the lower stage for the more mellower crew. The top stage was where the energy was, with progressive trance and breakbeats keeping people jumping around. I met lots of great people - no drugs, no aggro - this was much more sophisticated than my full moon party experience in Thailand. Speaking of full moon, the clouds were cloaking Mr. Moon, so didn't get the chance to bust out my werewolf tendancies. Fueled on redbull and various liquor I revelled until about 6ish in the morning. The last act kept going through to about 9am I think. I staggered up to find Kazu flaked out in the car and I crashed out in the tent, with the nights images and sounds ringing around my head. Up and outta there at 10am. Enjoyed soba noodles from Kakuya - famous local soba shop. Refreshed in the stream and bathed in the sun a bit to enjoy the much needed greenery of Minakami. Nice and content, Kazu and I were quiet and pensive on the drive back to Tokyo.
Must catch up on the sleep now;-)