Shirouma-dake aka Mt. Hakuba Winter Ski Descent

From the second floor café of the North Face Gravity Concept Store in Hakuba, one has an amazing view of the Sanzan, three of Hakuba's most iconic peaks overlooking the valley floor (see above). Throughout the season, my ski touring partner Josh and I find comfort in this cafe's relatively long hours, wifi, and craft coffee. Another draw is the panoramic view we're afforded by the west-facing windows.

Numerous chutes and couloirs veined down from the array of peaks, beckoning for us to fantasize from behind the glass cage. We dug up whatever sparse online beta we could to ready ourselves (shoutout skidescent.com). And then we waited. The January - mid February monsoon was a relentless snow machine, but the forecast was starting to let up. Josh and I both noticed that a weather window was appearing - cold, high-vis, low winds, and time for any new snow to consolidate. It was no longer fantasy - we were making concrete plans to ski the south couloir off Shirouma-dake (#3 in the photo), Hakuba Valley's tallest peak.

The night before our mission, Josh threw me into a groupchat with him and a third. "Tony, this is Ale, he's a ski guide in Hakuba and he's joining the mission". Score. A guide from a reputable outfit is always a welcome addition. Ale had freed up after clients cancelled and was stoked to join.

Day of. Green brick. Low avalanche danger at all elevations. Just like we had forecasted.

Rendezvoused @ Obinata bridge, ahead of schedule. Left a car behind for later and headed over to a ski-in ski-out lot at Tsugaike.

In addition to a massive Konbini haul (shameless plug), I decided to bring my Canon AE-1 on its maiden expedition. Ale passed me his Petzl Rad 6mm to even out the pack weights, which I'd estimate to weigh roughly 15kg (~33 lbs) a piece. In hindsight, I definitely should have walked up in my Dynafit Neo U's. I found them on consignment at Rapie's (just under 7000 yen 😏) a couple weeks prior but had procrastinated testing them out. I would have been 440g / 1 lb lighter on my feet had I gone out in the Neos, or roughly equivalent to 5 pounds removed from my backpack. For a short chill tour? Ningún problema. But for a 1900m vertical day …yabai 🫠🤦‍♂️.

If you can't tell already, I'm making excuses as to why I dragged. Get ready for some more!

The ascent was a trial. I usually drag behind or zip up ahead when taking photos…I dragged. Simultaneously shooting film for the first time and dealing with an unresponsive shutter was not ideal. I also popped a nosebleed that wouldn't clot no matter how much tissue I stuffed up my nostril. And to make matters worse, as we attempted to gain a shelf to access the Korenge ridgeline and entered a steep melt-freeze crust, we started hurting for more traction.

In this leg of the ascent, ski crampons improved the ascent from a 1/10 to a 7.5/10 while boot crampons improved the ascent to a 3/10. Josh and Ale had both while I just had the latter. Since I had started lagging so hard, Josh let me borrow his ski crampons and he bit the bullet. While Josh post-holed up, I got to continue distributing my weight over the course of my ski while punching my aluminum incisors into the icy snow. Thanks Josh!

We gained the ridge and started rounding our way towards Shirouma. At Korenge, we transitioned to our boot crampons to allow us to sidestep the upcoming terrain laced with boilerplate crust, wind-scour, cornices, ice, and rocks. At this point, I also swallowed my ego and asked Ale to take the rope back and Josh to take my Nalgene. I felt the pep return to my step and was now able to keep up! We unspaced at the bottom of a short but steep and icy couloir, unstrapped our ice axes, and watched Josh lead the way up while groaning from a leg cramp.

Summit

As we neared the summit, I saw large overhanging slabs of wind protrude into a narrow overhang. Wow, as if Frozone himself had phased a tsunami into a massif of snow and ice just as it began to crest, I mused.

We recollected at the summit and grabbed some photos. In the background, a sea of clouds pushed up against a natural gorge dam. I nearly lost my mind by how beautiful it all was. Ale built an anchor with his ice axe and rappelled into the drop-in to cut a ramp out of the cornice for an easier entry. We downclimbed to a platform, transitioned, and hop-turned down 50 degree no-fall boilerplate.

As expected, the ski out was quite variable. As Ale said, spending all day to find “marginal” turns sounds like a terrible trade-off, but we couldn’t have been more stoked on the day. We consummated the shuttle with the last of the daylight and made our way over to Hakuba Taproom to take the edge off.