Japan maggots not so excellent adventure

[StuntCok]

This weekend, I kept a promise to myself to take Fattwins up on his offer he made last year of showing me the goods in the Japan alps in Hakuba. For those that don't know, the Hakuba ski area in Nagano is the host site to the 1998 winter olymics and home to Japan's most serious terrain. The northern island of Hokkaido gets all the hype in the interational ski media for its cold smoke powder, but most of this is the result of one resort, Niseko, being owned by a western firm who knows how to manipulate the marketing/PR machine. In Japan, Nagano and parts of Gunma and Niigata are where it is at.

Anyway, it is quite a poor snow year for all of Japan but the first couple of runs, guided by Fattwins of the back of the Happo One resort, were epic. Great glades, not too much bush and deep, bottomless pow, with us the only ones skiing it. Still, Fattwins assured us that that the lines off Goryu were even better so, at about 11 we headed over.

In Goryu we picked up a couple of others. Amongst the Mags in the group were myself, Fattwins and Satori ( I can't remember if any of the others are maggots, the group was united more by the use of he SnowJapan forums). Anyway, we head off the south facing glades behind the resort which was mixed. At times it was deep face shots in spaced glades, at others it was cement. Still, it was good run but a difficutl traverse out due to low coverage. The second run we hit the north face (I think, my memory is poor due to boozing) and while the snow was good, the coverage sucked and the bushes made sking down much like being a ball in a Pachinko machine. In fact, I took a big branch in the mouth and will have a big fat lip tomorrow for my efforts. The bottom half of the run made up for the top with a couple of open shoots and even the odd "amature cliff" to huck. The nightmare started with the traverse out. To start, we had to fjord a creak, soaking us all to at least the knee, then boothike up a steep face to a road followed by a long, shitty traverse to the lifts.

Anyway, the above is skiing, for better and worse, what follows was outside the norm. On the last run out, we decide to duck some roaps for a last bit of untracked before calling it a day. Nothing dramatic or dangerous, basically, we hit an old lift line and ran out into patrol (the line was SICK until this point). Patrol catches fattwins first and we all decide that it is better to just get caught with him than leave him hanging on his own, so we ski to the patrol. After patrol taking our passes (expected) we get led to patrol shack and interrogated like POWs. After harrasing us, threatening us, even talking about calling the cops on us to charge us with trespassing, they figure out that Fattwins is a local schoolteacher. This really sets of the main dude. He slams the table twice (spilling my mountain dew on the floor) screams at fattwins, infroms him that his taxes pay his sallary (the irony of this police-like figure making this statement was not lost on me) and that Fattwins should be setting a better example. After taking our ID cards and whatnot, he actually tracks down the authorities at Fattwins school to bring them out to the resort! Now, I don't want to get into how the Japanese revere rules and such, but I will say, that this has now threatened Fattwins career as a public schoolteacher in Japan. So, for ducking ropes for a short run at Hakuba Goryu, not only have we been threatened with the criminal offence of trespassing, but Fattwins may loose his job. Sure, poaching may be a bit "bad" but, like speeding, we have all done it and, when we got caught, our careers were never put at risk. Lonnnng story short, Hakuba rocks even in a low snow year, Fattwins is a great guide, and NEVER poach lines at HAkuba Goryu.

Ohh yeah, and one of the binding bolts on my ARGs stripped loose which will force a remount, I lost my lucky leatherman and got a touch of food poisoning at a yakitori stand on the way home and now have horrible shits.

[addict]

HAHAHAHAHA! So you got done in FT, one day Ill teach you how to poach properly

[shmerham]

Holy shiite. That's terrible. I hope this all works out ok for fattwins. That's very scary.



I still want to go to Japan.

[Raps]

Damn dude, that sucks, hope his school is cool about it and doesn't fire him......

And the guy spilled your Mountain Dew!! Damn i would be super pissed!

[Rideski]

They provided a cold beverage while you were being interrogated?

[StuntCok]

Holy shiite. That's terrible. I hope this all works out ok for fattwins. That's very scary.



I still want to go to Japan.

Skiing in Japan is still great. Sking at certain resorts (like Goryu) is shit.

[emetic]

oh damn, hope ya get out of trouble FT. i'll be over in hakuba in 9 days now ... woot.

[satori]

My school's pissed at me for the situation. Not gonna get fired over it but, on an extremely busy day yesterday (school entrance exams) they had to deal with this shit. Fack me, I've been busted by patrol before and they've been calm, logical, and nice. The guys at Goryu are a bunch of Nazi's who are power-harrassing freaks - which is known by everybody who rides in Japan. The only thing I've learned from this is not to bother riding Goryu/47 and waste my money there. There are so many other resorts whose patrol is more relaxed and not so hungup on themselves.

Call my school??

It'd be like you getting a speeding ticket in the States and they call your boss, whoever, to tell them

Hope its all good for you Fattwins...

[fattwins]

Ill land on my feet about the yelling makes my go deaf.

Sorry to all involved I didnt think poaching the old run was gonna bring down so much trouble. Its not good for hakuba to have this shit. The good thing is that I dont spend much time in the resort anyways, this will just push me further into the Back COuntry which I love the most anyways.

PS HappoOne and Iwatake are not anal like Goryu/47.

[eskimobasecamp]

woaaahh! that sucks, hope everything is OK FT. that's why i don't ride with my school pass over on those resorts, or rather i don't bother with goryu/47 in general, cause i don't want to lose my pass. did you lose your season pass FT? sorry they went so crazy - the patrol at goryu are totally nuts. we'll have to be careful this year, if more and more people get caught they'll just get harsher and harsher. i hope some of the more chilled resorts don't start to change their policies.

[Bring On The Snow]

dude a patorller is not a cop he cant detain you u dont have to tell him shit( all he can do is take ur pass and call the comps if ur doing something illegal) I would have handed over my pass and peaced

[workinforturns]

well good to know. just turned in my application to study abroad in japan next fall, so now ill know where to go!

[rideit]

If you can provide an english customer service e-mail addy for Goryu, I would be happy to send a note stating why I have decided to take my '600 person a year European ski club' to another resort this coming season, due to the negative impressions that I have heard about the resort.

I can be quite persuasive. If you can get a direct e-mail to this fuck-knuckle power tripper, that would be even better.

But hell, they are probably meta-tagging every reference to the resort globally, knowing the Japanese. They would be onto us PRONTO!!!

(I would still be more than happy to send a note)

[StuntCok]

dude a patorller is not a cop he cant detain you u dont have to tell him shit( all he can do is take ur pass and call the comps if ur doing something illegal) I would have handed over my pass and peaced

My view exactly but being good citizens, the others decided to cooperate. I can assure you, had we known that they would be such cunts, we would not have stopped (even though Fattwins was on spats and would have been caught and tackled quick on the cattrack we were on). It confirms my view, in NEVER pays to cooperate with the man. I am off to destroy more value at work...

[Incompetent Boob]

What shit. Hope it works out for you CB and ft.

[ZebraHead]

Ill land on my feet about the yelling makes my go deaf.

And Fattwins and 0Bernhard Franz the same person?

[badmigraine]

"Aside from that, Mrs. Lincoln, how did you enjoy the play?"

[jerr]

They provided a cold beverage while you were being interrogated?

Maybe it was a traditional Japanese version of good cop/bad cop known as screaming cop/beverage supplying cop.

[setjo]

it does pay to cooperate if you don't want to aggravate some guy who actually has the power to fuck your life up.

bottom line is to cooperate as much as you need to and not a a bit more. Not sure what the deal is in Japan but I am not too keen on patrol detaining me. I prob would have walked...you are a customer...

[fattwins]

I would not usally cooperate with the man but because of the pass that I used I was forced to cooperate. I had hoped that by cooperating it would lighten the blow but it did not.

Im not worried I will still ski in the BC around there just not in the trees.

[s.p.c]

ft... sorry about your trouble. no wonder jer is always so paranoid, something i never fully get.

maybe more nagereha/ dynoland/ gifu, less hakuba would do the trick .

[fattwins]

nah just less goryu and more of the sic Back country

[workinforturns]

hey fattwins, wanna show me some BC next year in Japan around christmas time?

[StuntCok]

Japanese "news" is dramatised crap and I never watch it but last night I was coincidently buying a new mobile phone and while while waiting in the shop, there was a "special" on the TV entitled Gelende SOS highlighting the terrible dangers of skiing OB. There was footage of some gaper snowboarder on about 15 degree pitch in some brush. When he catches an edge at about 5km/h and face plants the announcer cries "is he OK?!". When they interviewed the outlaws who skied outside the ropes, their faces were masked by a digitised mosaic. It was pathetic but it highlights the safety hysteria here in Japan. Scare them into doing what they are told.

[fattwins]

Just act with your wallet.

Ill ski with anybody in the BC if they know as much as me or more.