Hokkaido Trip Report 2/1/24-2/11/24
If you are planning on a first time trip to Hokkaido I highly encourage the use of a tour operator, in our case Whiteroom tours. We were in Hokkaido 2/1/24-2/11/24 and made all land arrangements with Whiteroom including a guide for 3 days skiing in Niseko and 3 in the Furano region. There were no big dumps while we where there just a steady 8-10cm with two 18-20cm days. With a preference for quality (fresh powder) vs quantity our guide checked conditions daily at ski areas within an 1.5 hour drive. The result was 5 of 6 days with lots of fresh powder turns from boot high to crazy deep cold dry snow. We were on downhill gear, so no skinning and at most 10-20 minute boot pack to mostly out-of-bounds stashes in the trees. If we had been on our own we would have been limited to Niseko United and the Furano ski resort, which like any major resort gets skied out pretty quickly.
We skied a different area each day so my impressions of each area are limited to what we actually rode:
Day 1: Rusutsu - The inbounds “powder areas” were pretty chopped up but very skiable with some fresh turns. Seems that the resort runs along a number of ridge lines so we traversed down the ridge lines before dropping down into the trees for some fresh waist deep turns. As our guide said: “Japan come for the powder, stay for the traverse”.
Day 2: Kiroro - Spent the day skiing out of bound trees that went down into a creek bed. Great knee-high turns in the trees with a runout just above the creek that got more dicey with each run.
Day 3: Niseko Honozano - Only day we spent at Niseko United. We were staying in Niseko Grand Hirafu so it was maybe a 10-15 minute drive to Honozano which tends not to be as crowded as the other Niseko resorts. We spent the morning skiing boot to knee-high stashes in the trees. We then took lifts up above tree line where Grand Hirafu and Honozano converge. The highest lift is a fixed single chair. From the top of the chair there are entry gates. It was a bluebird day, the gate to the top Mt Niseko was open and there was an ant line of hikers heading up there for maximum vertical. We were not up for the hike so side stepped a bit up through an entry gate into a wide open bowl that funnled down into a gulch to take us back to Honozano. The bowl was tracked out but it was very soft chop and tons of fun. Once in the gulch there were fresh tracks to be had off to the sides.
Day 5: Travel day, 4 hour drive to north to Furano, Central Hokkaido.
Apparently Central Hokkaidon doesn’t get as much snow as Niseko and there was a persistent high pressure preventing storms from moving through. Still we were getting a few cm of fresh snow every day and it was cold, -6 to -12 centigrade, so whatever snow fell stayed cold and dry. It also meant that the main resort, Furano, was getting played out. We never ended up skiing Furano.
Day 6: Sohoro Ski Resort - Sohoro has a Club Med resort about an hour from Furano. Upside here is that it was not crowded and most people stuck to the groomed runs. Our guide took us into the trees in and out of bounds for boot to knee-high turns all day.
Day 7: Kamui ski resort - No accumulation was expected this day in Furano. Our guide was hoping that the Kamui ski area might get some fresh snow during the day. Didn’t really happen, still got some good turns in, stopped early and headed for a really nice onsen on the way home.
Day 8: Asahidake - Asahidake in Daisetsuzan National Park is the highest mountain in Hokkaido. It’s not really a ski area, there are no set runs but skiing is allowed. There is a tram that drops you off below the summit and two cat tracks set to get you back to the tram when things flatten out. All I can say is that was the deepest, driest powder I have ever skied. Totally crazy. There was fresh snow and for Asahidake it was really busy. With the tram running every 20 minutes our guide said to expect 4 runs for the day. There was plenty of fresh tracks at the beginning of the day and he did a great job of find stashes as the day went on. Visibility was poor so we never so the top of the mountain and the first few turns were tentative until we got into the trees. Did I say it was deep?
Day 9: Travel day to Chitose
Day 10: Fly home
