Ko-su Outo aka Backcountry Powder!!

... a few weekends ago, sick of the rinky dink hills here in Hyogo, I took a trip to Nagano, site of the 1998 Winter Olympics in search of big mountain riding... and boy did we find it. The main ski area is a two mountain range called Hakuba47-Goryu, meaning White Horse/5 Dragons. Well deserved names considering what an epic weekend it was.

On the advice of a local snowboarder, we spent the entire weekend riding "Course-Out-o" (out of ski area boundaries), which resulted in 40 minute runs through 2 feet of fresh, untracked powder snow. At any given moment you would be cruising knee deep in snow though trees, down bowls and valleys, natural halfpipes, and singletrack runs through the woods. It was amazing!

Sunrise on the way to the mountain.

The Ubiquitous Cute Japanese Cartoon Mascots

Maikeru scouts out the terrain. "It looks dangerous over there - that's where we should ride."

Keep Out in 3 languages. I betcha that's where the good runs are!

Uh, make that 24 Variable Courses (Merle illustrating our single run of the weekend). Love that new snow!!

If any of you ever make a trip to Japan in the winter, I highly recommend a trip to Nagano - I can see why they decided to have the Winter Olypics here, hot damn!