Experience Skiing in Japan

C

cameron_taylor

Member
I'm going to Japan next winter to work as a ski instructor and I was wondering if anyone has any recommendations or experiences of any of the resorts there, particularly Niseko, Rusutsu and Hakuba?

Cheers
 
Well what are you trying to ski?

In general, resorts in Japan sorta suck unless you want to risk getting your pass pulled. That being said, they empty out on pow days, and skiing bottomless untracked on mellow terrain just doesn't get old.
 
I have some questions about your upcoming travel.

How did you land a job as a ski instructor there?

Will you be instructing English speaking ex-pats and vacationers or are you a fluent Japanese speaker?

I just ask because I worked in Japan for a while and always found it difficult to get a job if you weren't a citizen. Could be different in different fields though.
 
I wanted to ski there too. I hope i can travel to japan like you. best of luck and enjoy bro. looking forward that you share your experience here when you get there.
 
13816801:Sharko said:
I have some questions about your upcoming travel.

How did you land a job as a ski instructor there?

Will you be instructing English speaking ex-pats and vacationers or are you a fluent Japanese speaker?

I just ask because I worked in Japan for a while and always found it difficult to get a job if you weren't a citizen. Could be different in different fields though.
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I became qualified by taking the BASI level 1 and 2 qualifications. Although if you look on the BASI website it says you can only teach in British snowdomes with level 1, certain countries such as Japan, Switzerland, Italy will allow you to teach their with a snowschool. Level 2 qualifies you to teach anywhere in the world except France which requires you to take extra tests.

Apparently I will be teaching mainly Australians and Kiwis as they tend to go to Japan as it is much closer to them than say Europe or North America. I do not speak a word of Japanese but i had 5 friends on my course who all got jobs with a snowschool called Gosnow despite not speaking a word of Japanese.
 
13816778:RudyGarmisch said:
Well what are you trying to ski?

In general, resorts in Japan sorta suck unless you want to risk getting your pass pulled. That being said, they empty out on pow days, and skiing bottomless untracked on mellow terrain just doesn't get old.
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Mainly powder although I love skiing anything that's put in front of me, it being carving up groomers, park, steeps, trees. I've just spent the past 7 months living in a french ski resort and we had the least snow the locals have seen in 5 years so I've been making use of what there is.

What do you mean by risking getting your pass pulled? My friends have been there all winter teaching and none of them had any problems with that?

Apologies for the double post.
 
13816999:cameron_taylor said:
Mainly powder although I love skiing anything that's put in front of me, it being carving up groomers, park, steeps, trees. I've just spent the past 7 months living in a french ski resort and we had the least snow the locals have seen in 5 years so I've been making use of what there is.

What do you mean by risking getting your pass pulled? My friends have been there all winter teaching and none of them had any problems with that?

Apologies for the double post.
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In many resorts, skiing anything off groomed runs is lose your pass. When your pass costs $1300, its a real bummer to lose it.

That being said, if you hike 5 minutes out of a resort boundary gate, you get access to some of the stupidest best easy sidecountry of your entire life. Just be prepared to be completely self sufficient out there - its the absolute wild west in terms of avy forecasts and other backcountry users. The things I've seen this past season were incredible.
 
13817079:RudyGarmisch said:
In many resorts, skiing anything off groomed runs is lose your pass. When your pass costs $1300, its a real bummer to lose it.

That being said, if you hike 5 minutes out of a resort boundary gate, you get access to some of the stupidest best easy sidecountry of your entire life. Just be prepared to be completely self sufficient out there - its the absolute wild west in terms of avy forecasts and other backcountry users. The things I've seen this past season were incredible.
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So I just spoke to my mate about this and he said that they have gates within the resort to access terrain, it's just straight off the top that you cant really ski off groomed runs. He also says the terrain is incredible if you know where to look, he found some amazing pillow lines and fallen trees to boost off and even a few cliffs apparently.
 
13817079:RudyGarmisch said:
In many resorts, skiing anything off groomed runs is lose your pass. When your pass costs $1300, its a real bummer to lose it.

That being said, if you hike 5 minutes out of a resort boundary gate, you get access to some of the stupidest best easy sidecountry of your entire life. Just be prepared to be completely self sufficient out there - its the absolute wild west in terms of avy forecasts and other backcountry users. The things I've seen this past season were incredible.
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Where were you skiing? I have done 9 seasons in Niseko and most resorts on Hokkaido aren't like that.
 
13817149:Rosbif said:
Where were you skiing? I have done 9 seasons in Niseko and most resorts on Hokkaido aren't like that.
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Hakuba. The resorts there are slowly changing to allow some areas of inbound tree skiing, but its going to be a while. I basically just used resorts for quick access and multiple laps of BC gates.
 
I think it depends on where you are. The Japanese have a reputation for enforcing the rules, but the further out you get in Hokkaido the less people care, it's actually a very liberal part of Japan. I used to ski at some of the less touristed resorts in Hokkaido, mostly Furano and Nukabira, and no one ever cared if I ducked a rope.

The best thing about skiing in Japan? Beer vending machines at the tops of the lifts.

Second best thing? Bowl of Ramen and hit the Onsen afterwards.
 
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