How Chasing Winter Became Real Life Careers

For years, I’d been finding ways to squeeze one more winter into my life. Some were sensible. Some definitely weren’t. I’d worked rentals, kitchens, night shifts, tuning rooms and just about anything else that kept me close to the snow. 

For a long time, the question was always the same: how do I get another winter? Somewhere along the way though, it started to change. I started asking something else. Could this actually become my life? By then I’d bounced through Fernie, Falls Creek, Niseko, Hakuba and Morzine, picking up skills, stories and mates everywhere I went. There was never a grand career plan. Mostly, I just really loved skiing.

After one of those Japanese winters, I ended up back in Niseko for a couple of weeks and more or less stumbled into Aries Lodge. I’d messaged the manager, Tom Melville, looking for somewhere to stay and hadn’t exactly received a warm invitation. But walking past one day, I thought, stuff it, I’ll stick my head in and give it another crack. I walked through the door and there was a bloke standing there with his bags packed, about to leave. It was Dan, one of my best mates from working in the kitchen at Wild Bill’s during my first Niseko winter.

We looked at each other as if to say, What the hell are you doing here?

Within minutes, Dan had vouched for me and disappeared out the door. Tom, the bloke who’d pretty much knocked me back, had somehow agreed to let me stay. Tom would eventually become one of my best mates. At the time, I was still learning how mountain life worked: sometimes showing up got you further than the perfect plan.

Then it was back to Australia and another Falls Creek winter. I’d been working for Central Snowsports and had built up plenty of rental experience by then. That was also where Elyshia entered the story. Lysh started working for me and I taught her the rental side of the business. We lived together, worked together and mostly took the piss out of each other. I was also extremely committed to being single at the time.

That went well.

Somewhere between the banter, long days and another Falls Creek winter, I caught feelings. Before long, we were together.

That made the next ridiculous Winter decision slightly different. Now there were two of us working out how to get back to Japan. We returned to Hakuba the following northern winter. By then I knew the place, knew the work and knew my way around a Japanese ski town pretty well. But something wasn’t sitting right. I couldn’t see where I was going. I’d spent years learning rentals, servicing skis, managing people and generally figuring out how mountain businesses worked from the ground up. I wanted more. Underneath all of that, I missed Niseko.

So halfway through the season, I said to Lysh:

“F*$k this. Let’s go.”

We packed our stuff and decided to head north.

We weren’t leaving everything to chance. We already had junior jobs lined up with Falls Creek Ski Lifts for the coming Australian winter. It was our foot in the door with a bigger operation and we knew what we were doing next. What we didn’t really know was what we were going to do for the rest of this winter. Minor detail.

We knew we wanted to finish it in Niseko. Getting there would test just how much.

There was a taxi, then a bus cancelled because it was snowing too hard… whilst we were on it. With no idea what was happening, a passenger that could speak English explained that the bus was being redirected to the closest train, to then be told it might not make it to the airport. When we finally got there, the flight board kanji translated to ‘Worst Return’… which apparently meant there was a chance the plane might have to turn around after takeoff.

By then, we’d had several fairly clear opportunities to reconsider. We did not take the hint. Eventually we landed in Hokkaido.

Naturally, we went straight back into the orbit of the old Wild Bill’s crew. Brett and Takayo had moved on to The Barn. There was a fancy French restaurant downstairs and Brett’s version of civilisation upstairs. Lysh had lined up a job there through the old crew. I still remember her watching one of the first drinks being poured and looking at me like something had gone terribly wrong.

“There’s no mixer.” I laughed. Welcome to Brett’s bar.

One glass of wine could mysteriously contain about two and a half glasses’ worth. A mojito could look suspiciously like a glass of booze that had once been introduced to a mint leaf. Lysh quickly realised what she’d signed up for. Meanwhile, I did what I’d always done: found work.

I started at a pizza place, moved from front of house into the kitchen, helped out guiding when I could and generally dropped myself straight back into Niseko life. We ended up at Bamboo Lodge. I was back around Tom, Sam (rest in peace), Hayden and the crew, and I reconnected with the Rhythm guys.

Then one night I bumped into Matt Hampton, the Rhythm boss. He looked at me and said something along the lines of, “What the hell are you doing back here?”

Fair question.

I told him I’d left Hakuba. I couldn’t see where the job there was going and, to be honest, I just missed Niseko.

Somewhere in that conversation Matt mentioned that Rhythm was thinking about opening a shop in Hakuba. Maybe, he said, I could run it one day.

That was pretty much it: no job offer, no contract, no clouds parting above Mt Yotei while someone handed me a career. Just a conversation in the few famous tsubo known as Barunbar.

I probably thought about it for five minutes and went back to whatever we were doing. Turns out it would become pretty important later.

First, there was another southern winter to get through. Lysh and I headed back to Falls Creek and started at the bottom with Falls Creek Ski Lifts. After everything I’d already done, I was back in a junior role. And I was completely fine with it. We wanted our foot in the door, so we got in and got on with it.

Then came a change of guard, something anyone who’s done enough seasons will recognise.

People who’d been there forever moved on. New people arrived. Another generation started coming through. About a year after Lysh and I had walked in as the new kids, we looked around and somehow found ourselves among the more experienced people there.

We hadn’t suddenly become wise old mountain folk. Everyone else had just left. That’s seasonal life.

Our junior positions became senior supervisor roles, followed by more responsibility and then shop management. Eventually I was managing an operation spanning seven shops and around 50–60 staff.

Which, when I say it like that, sounds suspiciously like a real job. I’m not sure I thought of it that way at the time.

I was still just doing winters: learning, taking on more responsibility, solving problems, managing people and trying to make things work. Then heading north and doing it all again.

There was never a moment where I sat down and mapped out a career in the snow industry. I wasn’t collecting qualifications. I was collecting winters. And somehow those winters were starting to add up to something.

I hadn’t forgotten that conversation with Matt in Niseko, either. Back at Falls Creek, I’d asked Rhythm to give Elyshia and me an opportunity. This time, Japan was going to be different.

A proper job. A proper visa. An actual pathway.

After years of piecing together whatever work would get me through another northern winter, I finally had a job to go back to. I was going back to Niseko. Only this time I wasn’t heading there to wash dishes, make pizzas, tune skis at night or figure out a job when I arrived. I was going back to work for Rhythm Japan.

Legitimately.

I spent the next two winters with Rhythm in Niseko. For the first time, I wasn’t asking, How do I get another winter? I’d answered it. Winter was my job.

For years people had asked me, “When are you going to get a real job?” I never had a particularly good answer. I just knew I wasn’t ready to stop.

Turns out all those years chasing snow, working random jobs, managing rental shops, tuning skis, making pizzas and saying yes to opportunities weren’t getting in the way of building a career. They were building one. I just couldn’t see it yet.

And that random conversation with Matt about Rhythm opening a little shop in Hakuba? Well, it hadn’t gone away.

But we’ll get to that.

Words and Photos: Austin Toner https://www.onlyfriendsonapowday.com.au/about