A Snowboarding Weekend

Saturday 27th January

Woke up early at 7:00am to go snowboarding at Kawaba! Set off at 7:30am, but there was an accident on the expressway causing a 1.5 hour delay…that was super unexpected, but there was no helping it. Arrived at the ski field at 10:30am, rushed to buy tickets (thankfully there weren’t that many people since everyone got stuck in the same traffic) and then managed to hit the slopes by 10:45am! Not too bad. Had a great day on the slopes – it was snowing all day today so although that meant poor visibility, it meant great snow, the best snow I’ve ever snowboarded on so far! The snow was so powdery that it was squeaking beneath your board. Had とんかつ for lunch – とんかつ is so perfect for a snowboarding meal cause it’s heavy and filling. It was super cold out today so my face mask kept getting frozen over! My hoodie really stood up to the winds though, it was great! The winds were really strong but I couldn't feel a thing because my hoodie is 100% windproof, and even though the waterproof rating is only 5K, it still didn’t get wet with all the constant snowing! Although that’s probably because the snow quality was powdery and dry so that probably helped. Had to take another short break after a few rounds to defrost my face mask and just dry out a bit in general (had a delicious caramel latte) before heading out for last runs before closing time. Headed back home and went to the onsen near my house before buying some dinner from Lawson and going back home. I also have to say that my car performed so well today! It was totally fine going up the steep (and snowy) roads to Kawaba, no problems at all, I’m very happy with it.

Sunday 28th January

Woke up early again at 6:45am for another day of snowboarding! This time at Kandatsu which is in Niigata. Amazingly enough it’s actually roughly the same amount of time to get to as Kawaba, but the toll fee is a lot more (¥990 for Kawaba but ¥2190 for Kandatsu). Went to fuel up a bit first before going to pick up another ALT friend, and then arrived at Kandatsu just before 9:00am (I had set off a bit later than planned, the drive only took an hour and 11 minutes). Geared up, bought our lift passes, and I headed out first for a few runs while the others sorted out their rentals (we had 2 ALT friends with us today who were snowboarding for the first time!). Kandatsu is such a nice little ski resort! Nice slopes, great runs, and it was also super clear weather today, but because of all the snowfall yesterday the snow today was still super powdery. Practiced a lot of carving – it’s so much fun! Met up again with the others when they’d finished their rentals, and then helped teach the 2 friends how to snowboard. Stayed with them a little bit, but then they got hungry so they went to grab an early lunch, so the rest of us decided to do a few more runs before getting lunch (since it was peak lunch hour at the moment). We each did a run with being filmed by the GoPro, but I’m so sad because when I looked at the footage later, all the videos I shot were super shaky and jittery. I think it’s because I didn’t grip the stick hard enough, but even so, I thought I had done a good job! Felt bad for my friends since I got them shaky footage. We went and had lunch after this (I had とんかつ again) and then also dippin dots ice cream!!! Yay. Went for a few more runs before we called it a day and drove back home.