Tuesday, February 14, 2017

Niseko-Annapuri summit runs in fresh snow

Japan ski trip 2017 ski day 5. Our first day at Niseko. We skied several runs from the Niseko-Annapuri summit access via Gate 3 and once via Gate 2. Its about 20 minutes to hike up the the summit. There is a little shelter cabin there.   The gate system is interesting.  Ski patrollers open them and sometimes check that your avalanche transceiver is on, and tell you "no patrol".



We dropped off the summit and skied the south west face dropping into a prominent gully that took us back to the piste and the Annapuri gondola lift.

The snow was great up high - fresh and deep.  Its a big enough hike to keep the hordes away.  There is nice easy angle tree skiing further down then a fast run into the gully and back to the piste.

I was lightly dressed and warmed up on the climbs but got a bit cold on the descents in the -5C temperature.  The gondolas lifts and chairs with bubbles provide some protection from the elements but the very top lifts are single chairs with no safety bar!

We finished the day with some great off piste runs from the top of the Grand Hirafu gondola, walking up the small hill behind it then descending through trees into a nice gully.

There were no massive queues. Its a huge resort with lots of lift capacity.   There are lots of foreigners skiing.  We met Swedes, Americans, Canadians, Australians and Kiwis.










GPS log

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