Last powder in Asahidake and Tokyo madness.

Our last days in Asahidake were actually pretty productive as we got some more snow. While a lot of it got windpacked and just blown away, we could find certain aspects where all this snow gathered and we could hit some pillows into deep Japanese powder.

 It was a good way to end the trip to Hokkaido although we have not had these unique powder runs which everyone has in mind when thinking of Snowboarding in Japan. Therefore we had an amazing time as a group and still collected a lot of cool footage I think.

From Sapporo we took a flight to Tokyo to spend three days in the worlds largest metropolitan area with about 35 Million people living here.

 At the airport we ran into a Japanese TV Production which were asking Fips about our Snowboard trip and what his riding style looks like.

 Shortly after we discovered that our photographer Silvano Zeiter is growing a single unicorn hair on his forehead.

 The first night in Tokyo we spent floating through the city and ended up in a bowling tournament with a lot of beer.

 The view at Breakfast the next morning on the 25th floor in Tokyo is quite ok.

 The city surely is something very different for us Europeans. Huge zebra crossings...

 ...world's second highest tower with a mind blowing view from the 450 meter high platform...

  ...colorful signs and weird noises everywhere...

But actually most important for me it was about the people. They really are different I think. Not only their look but their whole mentality seems to be extremely polite and friendly. And truely honest. I have bevcome a big fan of the Japanese people within the last three weeks.

One afternoon we did a fun tour through all the different snowboard shops in Tokyo which are selling Isenseven DVDs and we took pictures and gave signatures to the shop owners.

 We had an amazing night with our Japanese distributor Goh from Champion's Vision and his two colleagues who took us to a Teppanyaki and sushi place which was ridiculously good:

 No exaggeration but this piece of salmon truely was the best piece of animal I've eaten in my whole life!

 After a long delicious dinner they let us participate in another part of Japanese culture: Karaoke!

 Thanks to the people of Japan and their country for all the great experiences within the last weeks. It is a different world over there but it felt good to be a part of it.

Japow 2.0

After an amazing last night shred in Niseko we hit the road to Asahidake.

It was a long drive but luckily we had Fips with us who was catching up enough sleep for the whole crew!

In Asahidake we had one amazing blue bird day with a perfect view over this beautiful winter paradise.

 We used the good light to hike up closer to the volcano and check out the spots where the hot and stinky steam comes out of the rocks.

We actually found a good spot to build a jump right next to these massive clouds.

But of course such good weather is an exception in Japan at this time of the year and we soon turned back to dark clouds and hiking days in the woods...

 In the end you definitely spend much more time hiking and looking for stuff than what you actually came here for which is Snowboarding...

 The woods are really tight out here but sometimes you can find a way to make advantage of this fact...

Delicious conditions. Einfach klasse Mensch!

On the downdays we either had some amazing sushi of course...

... or I actually had to do some work for university. But the view out of my window gave me a hard time to forget about the snow.

  The amount of snow out here really is amazing. Especially as the snow can be so light, that you sink in waist deep but can still move like it was nothing. 

We keep praying for more!

Japan - 平仮名ひらがな

Japan. First time of my life. And it's amazing.

It really is a completely different world over here. Not just the amounts of snow and nature but most of all the small details in everyday life that make you feel the difference.

It's hard to describe in words but I guess everyone has got some pictures in mind about these extremly forthcoming and respectful people or the crazy noises and blinking lights with these weird signs.

Let's start with the picture story to give you a brief insight on what's happening right now. These days we are focussed on snowboarding:

Actually we have not been too lucky with the snow so far as everyone told us about something like 25 crazy powder days a month but just since we've arrived it has not snowed that much anymore. Still the amounts of snow are crazy over here and we managed to find good snow almost every day after thinking really hard for some time...

Today Fips Strauss and me had a very fun session. At first Fips tried to do some BS Miller Flip over a dead tree which looked really sick.

In the end Fips owned himself a whole sixpack of beer by proving to our Filmer Alex Schiller that he can actually do a decent Method first try.

Unfortunately Alex missed the shot as he was too busy playing in the snow...

A couple of days ago we went Night Snowboarding in Niseko which was an amazing experience since the snow was so light although everything was tracked already...

But of course it is not all about snowboarding over here. For example we took part in an "English Night" at the Hilton Hotel Niseko where we were having dinner with a huge group of 17 year old students who wanted to practice their English. They could hardly say more than "Do you have a girlfriend?" but we had a great time together anyways.

As well we did some sightseeing like going to the coast...

...or visiting this Japanese wall:

Now we are staying in some tiny village (about 5 houses) up North and are hoping for more snow to come. 

Thanks to Silvano Zeiter for all the pictures. Check out his high quality blog at: http://silvanozeiter.blogspot.jp/