Today the morning started off almost bottomless and was dumping so hard it ended up bottomless by the end. Epic mid season-like conditions with deep dry powder and cold temps. Could have done with a face mask. It was still nuking when we left at the end of the day and is forecast to snow until about 6am and then the sun’s supposed to come out so tomorrow is gonna be epic. Heres a vid from this afternoon.  

There hadn’t been much snowfall the last few nights here at the lodge, so I was caught off guard when  Keigo and Junko called and reported bottomless powder and blue skies at Cortina. Craig and I didn’t hesitate. We were out the door in a flash,  arms full of gear and still chomping down breakfast.  Luckily I remembered my camera in the kerfuffle and  snapped  a few shots of what turned out a most pleasant and powdery surprise!  

A strange blue gimp like being was spotted on the mountain today at Tsugaike. It turned out to be Morino guest Andrew from England. The blue suits are called morph suits and are all the rave in Britain it seems… The first thing one wonders when confronted with the morph suit is can you see? The second thing is, Can you breathe? Apparantly both functions are possible and you can even drink through it. The snow was pretty good on anything  north facing first thing, although by lunchtime the rising temperatures were turning the snow to sludge. A turn would create a mountainside of cascading pinwheels. Here’s Eric.  

A rollercoaster of weather in the last few days! 22 degrees C and sunbathing weather on Saturday, 90km/h Typhoon strength winds on Saturday night and dumping snow on Sunday! Fortunately, regular perusal of the Yahoo Japan zoom radar on through Sunday confirmed that the stiff north westerly was coating the north end of the valley with generous amounts of white gold! A Cortina stealth mission was called for and the elite squad of Morino staff and guests were deployed. 35cm of fresh lay in await. Darren prefers inhaling cold smoke to Tokyo smog. The Kids were having fun too!

Hit Cortina today after reports of 30cm of fresh started floating through the ether. Wasn’t 30, probably more like 20cm but on top of a soft buttery base so felt like 30! Had a great day ripping the trees in perfect spring weather. Here are some shots. At the end of the day a different view of familiar peaks. Happo on the right, looming over Iwatake.    

I ventured out with my camera the other day to see what captured my imagination.  The winner was this lovely pond at the base of Wadano, the dock still covered in new snow.  It  was so pristine and calm that it almost made me want to jump in… almost.

Just a few quirky moments from this week on the mountain…

Yes, there is still powder left to be had out there, and we were happy to go find it… everywhere!   Round 2 of winter has been an absolute blast.  Can’t wait til the skies unleash once again.