It was almost like “Spring has come” last week though we got some snow fall this week and it revived us. Then we renewed some of items in both Indy Park and N Park.

Also we have NORTHSTAR Ride&Jam. Please come and ride with Mike.

5m Kicker at Indy Park

Wave at Indy Park

4m Kicker at Indy Park

Tap Barrel at N Park

7m & 10m Kickers at N Park

Dan is on a newspaper. But he　did not do anything wrong. He was interviewed by Japan Times and it turned into an article, “Authenticity is All for Mountaineer”. Please check it out.

We stayed at Kuraigahara Hutte on the other day. Even though it is at 2,350m high the dinner was gorgeous. We had a deer meet pot. It is so rear to have a mountain hutte opens in the middle of winter.

Kuraigahara and Norikura are introduced in mountaineering magazin, “Yama and Keikoku”. The weather in March is more stable than January or February and it would be good for backcountry riding. But please be aware for sudden change of snow pack because of temperature changes.

I recently had a kicker building session with our good friend “Mr. Piston Driver” and Seiya the head park builder. We were working to build the main line kicker which is about a 10m jump. Anyway, please check out the movie below and also check out our YouTube Channel.

Time flies so fast. Next weekend is SFC Rail Jam. We are waiting for your entry!

It snowed so hard you couldn’t see 1 meter ahead ~ the wind was nasty, it was minus 13 Celsius!  Then we had a blue bird day with great powder and great HOT-DOG JAM. Then it rained!  Wow!  Weather impacts us all and yet it was amazing that in the rainy slop, I had one of my best rides.  Got off the top lift, buckled into my Gentem, and had a super fun, surf style ride.  Hit a cornice, slashed the wet snow, just hooped and hollered.  Yes, I had a good board, with good wax … but ultimately it is a choice ~ the choice to live, the choice of joy … definitely all we want to be to celebrate life, celebrate adventure and it is a choice that we make.

Let’s ride together!  Dan

We had Hot Dog Jam at Norikura Kogen Onsen Ski Resort. We had 35 riders mainly from Matsumoto area and also from Aichi and Shizuoka. All riders enjoyed the jam session with relaxed atmosphere.

Result Men

1. Toshihiro Takei (Shiojiri / Ski)
2. Kazuma Iida (Aichi / Snowboard)
3. Souta Umehara 8yrs old (Tokyo / Snowboard)

Result Women

1. Mami Miyazawa (Matsumoto / Snowboard)
2. Natsuki Shimizu (Shiojiri / Snowoboard)
3. Seiko Hashimoto (Aichi / Snowboard)

Thank you so much for joining to the event. It becomes middle of the season and we would like to have fun together to push Norikura’s Park Scene.

Future Events
Sat. 2/27  SFC Rail Jam
Sat. 3/13  NORTHSTAR Ride&Jam
Sun. 3/28  Hot Dog Jam Session B

Seiya and I recently put together a short video intro of the Indy Park at the Norikura Kogen Onsen Ski Resort. It’s located on the quad chair and is a great beginner/intermediate park. Please have a look at the video and also check our YouTube Channel for more videos.

I took Japan Avalanche Network’s Avalanche Operation Level 1 two weeks ago.

18 people gathered from all over Japan. Main lecturer was Mark Bender who is a heli guide in Levelstoke in BC, Canada. As the translator, we had Yusuke Hirota who works at Baldface where Craig Kelly developed. As other lecturers, we had Nori Saotome who is a heli guide in NZ and also Dave Enright from Ever Green Outdoor Center in Hakuba

In the 8-day course, started a day with observation of tempaliture, weather, wind, snow, etc and after 1-2 hours of class to put as much knowledge about avalanche as we could, went out to backcountry field to hike, dig a pit, observe snow pack and little bit of ride. Then came back to class room and analyze snow stability from the snow pack observation. Those 8 days were putting as much knowledge of avalanche as you can and dug many pits, hike and traverse slopes after skiers (it was hardest ever though) and built up the way of thinking about avalanche.

This is a new type of complession test to anlyze snow stablity called “Extended Clumn Test (ECT)”. Compression test uses 30cm×30cm snow pillar though ECT is trying to observe how the snow pillar break and how the break transmitted as using 30cm×90cm snow pillar. It has become the standard in the states and it will be also in Canada next year. Probably Japan will follow them soon.

I learned so much though those who join this kind of traiing are so unique. Below is our group pic.

Certificate of the course and my bady, BURTON Fish 160. It took me a while to get a best setting though I found that narrower stance works better.

Then I stayed one more night and rode with the guides who took the course togethere. We hiked up from the top of  Hakuba 47 and had great tree runs. It is a kind of rare for me to ride other field and it was good “market research”??

We’ve got so much snow already, so we made a jump in the N Park!!

It’s 8 meters (about 26 feet).  It looks scary at the first, but once you hit it, you realize how smooth and easy it is to hit.

It will only be open only for the next 3 days, so come hit it with us!!

Indy Park, Snow Adventure Park for beginners and families will be open this weekend. We started building the park from today after lifts stopped with full support from Norikura Kogen Onsen Ski Resort.

We will offer Free Park Lesson as the opening event. Also we will have kids snowbaord camp, Kirara@NORTHSTAR. Please come and ride with us.