Japan 2012
Flying through Los Angeles
International Airport sucks.
It is old and smells mildewy.
However, most cross-Pacific flights leave around midnight and most of
the restaurants are closed.
So, you’re stuck with Panda Express or
McDonald’s.
And LA is hot and sticky.
So,
landing in Tokyo Haneda International Airport was quite refreshing.
The air was cool and crisp.
There were easy to recognize signs that
pointed us in the right direction.
The bus to the domestic terminal ran
frequently and was on time.
The domestic terminal was clean and was
already serving various breakfasts at 5:00am.
But we couldn’t decide if
we had just had breakfast on the plane or not.
And it wasn’t really typical breakfast food, by Japanese or
American standards.
We opted for no breakfast yet.
Our stomachs were
too confused.
Our
flight to Chitose Airport on Hokkaido left Tokyo a little late.
A
snowstorm on the North Island was apparently causing some difficulties.
Much praise should go out to the pilot too for landing
that bird with very little visibility.
And here I must mention a big
cultural difference between the United States and Japan.
It comes when
the plane is taxing to its gate after landing.
In the United States,
what is the first thing you hear upon landing?
Click, click, click, click, click.
The sound of seat belts being
unfastened.
(I’ve never really
understood this.
Where are you going anyway?
You’re stuck there until
the doors are opened.
Unclicking and standing up gets you nowhere)
What happens in Japan?
The captain comes on the intercom and
welcomes everyone to Tokyo.
Japan=Orderly
My dad had been doing
work in Asia and had just finished up a lecture in Tokyo.
He had flown
to Chitose the day before and stayed at the airport hotel.
Even with the bus full, it’s remarkably quiet.
People
sleep or carry out quiet conversations.
For the next two hours the bus
wove its way along the equally quiet winding, snow-covered, roads.
Scott and I were awed by the amount of snow that they had here.
We knew
Japan had extraordinary amounts of snow and were glad not to be
disappointed.
Colorado, you see, was having a terrible winter.
Very
low snow and very high avalanche danger.
But Japan, year after year,
routinely gets a lot of snow.
Only it’s not like the American truck
stops.
Bao is a sweet doughy roll stuffed usually with meat or
vegetables.
They’re about the size of a grapefruit and are cozy, hot,
and steamy.
Best truck stop food ever!
Hirafu
is in a way, like many ski resort towns around the world.
And with many ski towns on in countries on the
Pacific, there are a lot of Aussis.
Take our bowls of
noodles.
is about the size of a mixing bowl used for
baking.
By the way, I seemed to have missed the
description of one very important part of Japan.
It’s
like the captain’s seat at the Star Ship Enterprise.
The first great
surprise is that they’re heated.
Additionally, there is a front and back bidet that has a heat and
pressure control setting.
Oh, and a butt dryer.
Looking outside the
window of our room, this looked wonderful.
One foot on top of their
already 15 foot base!
The snow banks outside were already taller than
the first story of the Lodge.
That the warm weather and wet snow from the day before
made it not typical Japan.
For us, who were coming from the worst
Colorado winter in three decades, this was great.
Thomas, a Frenchman,
from New Zealand was here for his first season of guiding in Japan.
This would be
only my sixth day back on skis this season.
And Scott
never gets tired.
The slope varied between steep to mellow but
always in open Birch forests.
Over loud speakers on the lift towers, Opera blared all over the
mountain.
This was quite a change from Annupuri which had some angry,
gangta rap playing over its megaphones.
But the Opera did seem more
fitting for this quiet mountain.
There were less "serious" looking
skiers over here, more family and kids.
Lunch
at Annuprui was a good introduction to how I think many quick lunches
are served.
Outside the cafeteria there is a display case.
Inside the
display case there are plastic versions of all of the meal choices.
Next to the display case is an electronic kiosk.
From the kiosk you
opt for meal option you desire, perhaps a beverage, and pay.
Resting was for the gondola
and lifts.
I think this is how dinner went every night of the trip.
Day
two would be some backcountry skiing on Shiribetsu, a 1200m mountain in
the shadow of Mt.
We’re going to get lunch from 7-11?
They also had this tasty little pocket
treat called Onigiri.
It’s like a giant, contained Sushi hand roll.
But they’re packaged perfectly.
The occasional bamboo shoot sticks up through the snow.
The
snow pack across Hoikkaido sits on this bamboo.
Which sometimes can
offer a more stable base than Colorado snow pack, which sits on rocky
slopes.
That base difference creates a difference in how the snow warms
and thaws.
But instead of
collapsing, breaking apart, and sliding all the way down the slope.
The
crack slide is just a settling, a moving of the slope just a few feet.
This does create a mini-crevasse that can range from 3-10 feet deep.
Only the ground is bamboo.
The snow is quite interesting here.
It is light yet sticky.
A
three foot diameter mushroom of snow can pile up on just a six inch
diameter branch.
But if you were to ski through this pillow, it would
disintegrate into the fluffiest powder instantly.
Today, Thomas
seemed a little more subdued from Annupuri.
Regardless, by the
time we reached the top for the second run, we were all bonking.
Time
for those delicious Onigiri!
They really are perfect for the hungry
skier.
Mitch
from the Lodge was right though.
And soon after noon the clouds rolled
back in and snow began to fall.
Not the best snow eh
Thomas?
The face shots were so frequent that my sense of direction would
get a little skewed.
Odi belongs to Andrew (Canadian, eh?)
and Yuri (Japanese) and
is a Chiwawa mix who is afraid to go down stairs….
I wonder what he
thinks of the skate ramp then in the office.
Rusutsu is interesting to look at when you first pull up to it.
First, there is a full size amusement park.
Second, there are two separate
mountains with the small valley with the roller coaster in between.
A
gondola connects Rusutsu East and Rusutsu West.
Rusutsu West is much
larger than Rusutsu East.
In fact, much like Shiribetsu, it’s much
bigger than I previously imagined.
Trade the birch trees for
aspens and triple the size of Powderhorn, and you would have Rusutsu.
Well, only Powderhorn doesn’t have Japanese toilettes and a Ramen bar,
complete with roe.
Yeah, like nicotine
and Red Bull combined.
The next day we flew back to Tokyo.
But Narita also has some remarkable other sights.
Hello Kitty was everywhere.
However, we were surprised not to
find any Godzilla memorabilia.
The
line was long with locals too, so we figured we had to try whatever this
was.
next "attraction" down the road was a certain Unagi shop.
Unagi is eel
and there are about 60 shops that serve eel in just that neighborhood.
This shop however, had a guy right on the sidewalk, butchering live
eels for immediate grilling.
He would dunk his hand into a bucket of
water, full or writhing eels.
This process takes all but
ten seconds and he seems to do it all day.
we neared the temple and mingled up the steps with those who came to
pray.
Some of the buildings after the main gate are over 300 years old
and enshrine sacred Buddha statues.
But the real prize is walking
through the Naritisan Park.
For
several moments it rang and for several moments everything else was
silent.
There is a sense of order and a sense that that order
brings peace to one’s soul here.
It is about making the simple things be pleasant.
Cha meaning tea and Do
referring to Tao and The Way.
Nothing is materialistic about a tea
ceremony.
It made the hustle and bustle of the
airport seem slow and methodical.
