Thursday, February 16, 2017

Last day at Niseko off piste at Hanazono in good snow then transfer to Rusutsu

Japan ski trip 2017 ski day 7.  Our last day in Niseko. We had hoped to ski up and down the big volanoe Yotei but weather and access was against us.

The visibility was not so good and strong winds up high meant the top lifts were closed so Dave and I bought 5 hour tickets and skied the off piste run at Gate 9 hunting out fresh tracks through the trees.

We then headed across to Hanazono and skied Gate 5 staying left and dropping into a creek that had a a cat track that went up both ways.  We followed a boot trail for a short while then decided to continue down the creek for a long way, eventually emerging at the bottom station of Hanazono.  We skied the rest of our runs from Gate 5 traversing back to get the top chair.

The chair had a hood so it was good for snacking and drinking.

We skied back to Hirafu then walked down to the backpackers arriving at 2:30.  After a nice cup of tea we packed rapidly then Niss drove us to the Welcome Centre and we boarded the local Donan bus to Rusutu.

We passed through some reasonable sized towns then arrived at the massive Rusutsu Resort with light snow falling,  A short walk got us to our lodgings at Pension Skybe.  The guy there spoke no english but we got into our room for a rest.

Dave and I headed out for a fantastic dinner at the nearby traditional Yochan restaurant (Izakaya). I had a crab steamboat and Dave had Mongolian Mutton.  A very filling meal and a friendly place.

Yochan restaurant (Izakaya)

Pension Sky Be

Rusutsu Izakaya Tampopo Shokudo


GPS log

1 comment:

Immanuel uy said...

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