Furano and Sapporo

[RooFlyer]

I'm thinking about a non-ski season trip to Japan, but it just seems so wasteful .

We can politely disagree on that

 

[Seat0B]

Wednesday 29 Jan 25 - A Bad Viz Day

It's snowed for the first time since we arrived - maybe 5 cm, but at least it's something. It's cloudy. And foggy. So cloudy and foggy, I can barely see to the second pylon on the Kitanomine lift. And, my legs are tired after 3 great days of skiing. I think a rest day might be in order, especially as there is more snow in the forecast.

So we called it. Tidied up our room a bit to give a bit more horizontal surface to put things on. Wrote up my trip diary that I am now using as a resource to write this TR. Caught up on emails, both business and social. Caught up with friends and family. Read my book. Planned my coffee treat at Ronin.

Blast it, its 1240 and the sun is shining and the lift lines are short. Perhaps we made the wrong call. Anyway, the call was made, so we set off to explore a bit more of the neighbourhood. Regular readers know that one of our favourite things to do anywhere in the world is head to the suburban backstreets and see how people live. So off we headed, wearing sunglasses and debating whether we needed neckwarmers and super warm gloves, or just a scarf and light gloves.

We barely got around the corner when the weather suddenly changed - heavy cloud and then light snow, which strengthened over the next 30 mins to heavy snow, wind and fog. OK, we made the right call after all!

On our walk, we found a Lawson konbini about 900m from our hotel. Bought a few snacks and some sandwiches for lunch. Then we headed back through the burbs in the falling snow on fairly slick and slippery streets despite their sprinkle of grit. In Kitanomine, the "must have" "keep up with the Joneses" accessory was a pimped up personal snow plow. Some of these were very fancy indeed with mag wheels and chrome things everywhere. I do regret not taking photos, but I was cold and under-dressed and so I didn't. It was the classic demonstration of how quickly the weather can change in the mountains. We left in sunshine. Then came this:





Which quickly turned to this:



So we dropped in on Ronin on the way back and wereglad to pay JPY750 for a coffee.

Next was a hotel pyjama clad walk to the onsen for a good long soak. Then dinner and an early night - a bit excited about the forecast for overnight snow. Finally hoping for the much promised "powder every night" to eventuate. Fingers crossed for us please.

 

[Justinf]

Saturday 25 Jan 25 Part 3

Boarding was by a strictly enforced Group system. My Boarding pass said Group 1 and as we were travelling together on the same PNR, I expected Mr Seat 0A's to aslo be Group 1. But no, as a QF LTG (OWS), he was allocated as Group 2 and they were not willing to override th computer to let him through. Not a big problem, but not what I expected. Boarding was quite orderly, and reasonably fast, with everyone on board in approximately 20 minutes.

The A350 is huge inside, and JAL ran it with First, Business and Economy. Business was 1-2-1 and Business was 2-4-2. I don;t know what econmy looked like! Business looked and felt very much like Premium Economy, but it was comfortable for us as a couple travelling together being seated in one of the 2 seat sections. The seats were quite spacious, and as a shortie, I had plenty of room, as did Mr Seat 0A, who is 180cm. He also appreciated having a window and daylight.

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The flight map was interesting. It's a geopolitical reminder of how close Russia is to Hokkaido.

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The flight was quite short, just over an hour. We were served a choice of hot/cold drinks, but no food. This also surprised me. Economy seemed not to be served anything. First looked like they got similar to QF Dom Business.

The JAL Priority Bag tags work much much better than the QF ones do and our bags were very prompt arriving at the carousel in New Chitose. We were out into the arrivals concourse very quickly and have 1hr 45 mins to wait until our bus to Furano. We passed the time exploring the absolutely massive shopping centre upstairs on the departures level, although on so little sleep and with all the Japanese noise and the effort of speaking Japanese, I felt a bit overwhelmed when confronted with a huge array of bento boxes for lunch. So I opted for my go to favourite comfort food in Japan - a konbini tamago sando and a bottle of cold green tea. Mr Seat 0A had a tonkatsu sando. We both nibbled a small block of Meiji Chocolate. Our wait again passed quickly and soon we were aboard our last leg - bus to Furano. I watched out the window for a bit, but soon the warmth and the white noise of the bus worked their magic and I drowsed off to sleep, only waking a few minutes before Furano, with a cricked neck. We were delivered to the hotel door at 1445, and yes, don't you know it, we had to wait until 1500 precisely before we could be checked in. So we did a small walk around the facilities of the hotel and checked in at precisely 1500.

We are staying at Hotel Naturwald Furano and it is quirky, and cutesy, and kitsch in that (good) Japanese way. I'll do a separate post later about the hotel. The longer I stayed, the more I liked it! We have half board here (breakfast and dinner included each day), and selected the early sitting 1730-1900. So to fill in the time until could legitimately go to bed, I contented myself with unpacking my things, putting my skis in the ski locker, having a long soak in the onsen, eating dinner and was in bed asleep by 2000. Unusual for me as I'm usually a night owl.

Tomorrow we ski. It has been a very long journey to get here, so I really hope the snow is as good as everyone has raved to us.


Edit: Correct typos

It has caught many a traveller out, including this one.
Economy - drink, normal seat
Business - drink, bigger seat
First - meal, slightly bigger seat than J

Given the short flight times on domestic, J is rarely worth it.
Enjoying the TR.