Powder Wars: Kiroro Goes for World #1

Who really has the best consistent resort powder on the planet? With apologies to Utah, and a few others, all good on their day, the sheer regularity of the snow at Niseko has made it the acknowledged #1 for well over a decade since the word spread.
But nearby Kiroro is a making a serious claim for the title, off the back of yet another season when they clearly had the most pow days in the region. Kiroro’s new back country access exit points provide off-the-lifts entry to open up big chunks of the awesome terrain and snow on offer there. Even better, there will be new snowcat and guided access options too.
Time was when lines like this one were there for the taking at Niseko, without the competition. At Kiroro you can still get them, but the competition will hot up there too as word spreads, so lock in a visit soon says Owain Price.

Kiroro’s snow drenched location is no accident: the original owner over flew the whole of Hokkaido by helicopter in June, scoping locations for his planned new winter & summer resort destination, and noticed that only central Hokkaido (around Asahidake), and the Kiroro area, still had substantial snow on the ground.

He was obviously a smart guy, by doing that he guaranteed his new resort – Kiroro only opened in 2001 – would always enjoy a long season. For example, last season, which was a relatively slow start snow year for Hokkaido, they ran from 21st November, 2014 to May 6, 2015.
Being so new meant Kiroro kicked off with top notch modern lifts, hotels and facilities, something you soon appreciate on a typical dumping day when the gondola or bubble cover express chairs are definitely all you want to be riding on. Our favourite is the express double bubble cover lift. It’s short, but it lets you lap some of the best in-bounds along the ridge skier’s left below the top section of the gondola.
The resort’s location is also very convenient: just 30km, or 40 minutes, from the port and fishing city of Otaru, with free shuttles from the JR station for Kiroro hotel guests; 90 minutes from New Chitose Airport; 60 minutes from Sapporo; and 50 minutes from Niseko – with some great day tours and a daily return bus service in main season.
Despite all the great snow, Kiroro slipped under the radar for most western visitors until fairly recently, partly because the resort wasn’t that keen on allowing access to all their powder. The groomed runs are mostly mellow cruisers, so for advanced skiers options were limited without diving into the more tempting off-trail terrain.
Fortunately things have changed rapidly over the past few seasons, with new management – the resort is owned by a major Thai company with key western staff on board who understand what our market wants.

Back in March we were given the background on what’s in the pipeline, and it’s all very exciting to put it mildly. They started with the Powder Zone, an in-bounds off-piste area, that has proved hugely popular the past couple of winters. This season they up the ante with a new back country access system, through 3 designated exit points, that will be available after completing pre-registration requirements, which involve guests filing a climbing plan (Tozankeikakusho) with the Hokkaido police and new Kiroro Mountain Club desk. Assistance with these formalities is available at from resort staff – the police component only has a Japanese website to do it online at the moment, but it can be faxed in after completing the English version, at Kiroro or before. See details in the box up opposite.
Plus there will be a new “Cat & Hike” program, with a cat ride most of the way up the ridge behind the hotel, and touring on to the top. Details were still being finalised as we went live with this issue, but it will include lead and tail guides, with English and Japanese speakers available. This will be the only access to the ridge other than hiking over from the base of the resort. It will be available to anyone, but Kiroro Mountain Club members will get a discount.
SnowAction got a sneak preview of the new exit accessed areas at the beginning of March, when, after a couple of weeks of unseasonal warmish weather and little snow – at both Hakkoda and Niseko we lucked out for serious powder – Kiroro turned on 30 – 40cm overnight, while Niseko only got 20cm or less. We hitched a ride over with Darren Teasdale from Niseko Photography & Guiding, who has been running guided trips there for years. He had a back country film shoot booked with Australia’s #1 female freeskier, Anna Segal. While they built kickers and did flips up on the ridge in the new cat & hike zone, we hit the awesome new exit point terrain.
Richard Smith, a young English snowboarder who’s job description entails supplying material for Kiroro’s excellent social media feeds daily, showed us the ropes. He knew exactly where to head to find the best snow, as deep and steep as available for me, and plenty of tasty tree features for him.
Prior to catching up with Richard I had fun on the existing powder slopes, off the ridge down under the gondola, getting in 3 laps on the double express chair there, moving further along the ridge each time as it got tracked on the short steeper upper section, and then taken a mellower line back the other way, skier’s right off the Expert B course into the original Powder Zone area. This is good too, with the only drawback being a long run out to the base is necessary to repeat the process.

So by the time I hooked up with Richard it was already midday, which would be all over red rover for the powder most places, but he took me out to find clean lines skier’s left from the top of the gondola where the new Asari Exit will be. As the gondola had been shut the day before there was even more snow, which had hardly been touched, thigh deep in the gullies with plenty of big slash opportunities. The trees are well spaced and you can really open it up, just needing to watch out for the creek line on the run out – some friends dug a guy out here who had headed out on his own and got buried up to his neck falling in a hole there.
After a few laps I finally had my Mad Japow Disease under control again, for the first time on the trip. Fellow sufferers will know what I mean, all your expectations build up for weeks prior to travel, then you finally get here all excited, after months off snow, and if it doesn’t happen straight away you just get rattier and rattier till it does. In 10 seasons going to Japan it’s never taken me so long to get that pow fix, with only windblown pockets at Hakkoda and a boot deep night session at Niseko to show for my week in J-land up to that point.
Which illustrates exactly why Kiroro is seriously challenging for the title of #1 best resort accessed powder on the planet – it’s not best on every day, it’s not steepest or most challenging, but it’s definitely the most reliably consistent, year in, year out.
Of course different seasons bring different weather patterns, and last season, with it’s unusually long lulls between snow cycles around Rusutsu and Niseko, seemed to always look after Kiroro. The previous year it was a similar story, a poor season by Niseko standards (remembering that their poor is still awesome compared to anywhere outside Japan), while Kiroro kept getting fresh dumps.
On our 2014 visit I have never ridden in a happier bus than on the return day trip back to Niseko, which was full of the buzz that only a great powder day leaves you with, “Best snow I’ve ever seen!” and “Best day ever!” were the sort of comments coming from the happy mixed crew of mostly young boarders and skiers. And that was a day when bad weather kept the gondola shut, so everybody was excited about their day spent mostly in the Nagomine peak area, the lower of Kiroro’s two summits, which accesses a kilometre or so long spread of easy gradient runs.
This emphasises why Kiroro is the perfect place to get your powder act together at, with lots of these easy lines where you can get up the speed you need to start to feel how to ride pow without wiping out straight away, as often happens in steeper terrain.
That applies to the hits and natural features like tree jumps as well, you can smash big ones for 30m airs like Richard, or pop small ones like me.
But if crew like the Crist brothers, who were there in 2015 filming for Stellar Adventure Media’s Life Beyond Walls, are impressed enough to come back with a tour group in 2016, then you can be assured there is plenty to tempt the more gung-ho.

Obviously the more film clips, the more write ups, and the more word of mouth, the more this place is going to get busy, so our advice is to get there sooner rather than later.
Day trips are great, but staying at the base is better, especially with the new Kiroro Mountain Club early access benefits. There are only two hotel options. The sumptuous 282 room The Kiroro, Tribute portfolio (former Piano Hotel) has the most features, located a kilometre below the resort base, with several restaurants, indoor/outdoor onsen and a little “village” shopping area. But the 140 room ski in/ski out Sheraton Kiroro (former Mountain Hotel) at the base is really where you want to be to jump on first lift. Their buffet meals are pretty spectacular, great for the big recharge after a huge powder day. Otherwise there’s not a lot here – the Mountain Centre has all the basics of hires, ski school etc, ski shop, new coffee shop, and a public hot bath, but Kiroro’s not where you come for party nightlife. It’s good for families, and excellent for beginners and early intermediate skiers. But for most of our readers the key is this is where you come for self-contained access to amazing amounts of fresh snow. The huge news that they are getting organised to open it up properly for the 2015-16 season only adds weight to the equation.
So is it the World’s #1 for resort powder?
Send us your thoughts to snowaction@icloud.com

the ticket [ kiroro ]
Day trips from Niseko www.nisekophotography.com
Resort www.kiroro.co.jp/en/winter/
Packages www.skijapan.com

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details www.skijapan.com

Valid for stays from 28 February 2016. Subject to availability and changes in price due the exchange rate fluctuations.