In a sense, this trip up Soshubetsu-dake continued on from exploration we’d done to Karifuri-dake a few weeks prior. The northeastern slopes of Karifuri-dake were sublime powder, so Soshubetsu-dake seemed, on paper, to offer similar snow quality. We were much later in the year this time around though, so we didn’t have our hopes up too much.
The snow was very firm underfoot as we set off. It was spring conditions, and everything had frozen overnight. We were skinning along the snowed-in forestry road on concrete.
With a bright blue sky above, however, we were confident things would soften up as the day wore on.
After about 45 minutes on the road, we cut up the hillside towards the main ridge to Soshubetsu-dake. We were surrounded by beautiful old-growth forest, frosted white.
The benefit of starting from the main Nissho Pass highway, close to Nissho Pass, is that you’re starting quite high in altitude. Therefore, it doesn’t take long to hit the treeline. This route up Soshubetsu-dake was no exception. Soon we found ourselves on a broad open slope. This promised to give us some beautiful mellow turns on the descent.
From the treeline to the summit of Soshubetsu-dake was very short. Perhaps 20 minutes or so.
We’d heard that Tomamu Ski Resort did cat skiing from the Soshubetsu-dake peak, and sure enough as we approached the peak we could hear the rumble of a ski cat.
We were not quite quick enough to catch it this time around, however, and only caught a glimpse of it as it started its return down to pick up the skiers – the skiers were also already making their way down the northeast slope.
We’d skinned up the southern aspect of Soshubetsu-dake, but the snow surface conditions weren’t much better on the northeastern side of the peak, where the cat ski guests were skiing. It was around lunch time, so we sat down in the sun for a bite to eat.
By the time we’d finished our snacks, the cat was trundling back up to the summit. I ran up to take some photos, and saw none other than the famous-in-Hokkaido Neil Hartman (of Car Danchi fame).
I was excited to see Neil, because he’s a legend. He’s also involved somewhat in the Tomamu cat skiing venture. I was keen to make the connection in order to find out exactly where Tomamu leases land for the cat skiing. If I could find that out, then I could mark the area respectfully and accurately on the PDF map I was planning to make for the area.
Long story short, despite Neil’s best efforts to connect me to the people in the know, the people in the know were unwilling (or didn’t really care) to engage with HokkaidoWilds.org. To the best of our knowledge, it appears Tomamu probably does lease the cat ski uptrack land (for the cat roads), but probably doesn’t actually lease the broad swaths of mountainside to the northeast of the Soshubetsu-Karifuri Ridge where the guests ski.
If anyone has any information to the contrary, we’d love to hear about it!
One possible reason why Tomamu Resort didn’t bother to engage with us regarding the extent of their lease is that in reality, it’s unlikely they will ever need to compete with recreational private skiers on the terrain where they do cat skiing.
That is to say, we were keen to make the most of the day, so we dropped down the northeastern side of the peak for a bit until the snow got too soft, sticky, and warm. To get back to where we’d come from, we had to skin back up to the peak. Even if a private skier wanted to snake the good lines in the cat skiing terrain, there will always be the sting in the tail of having to skin back up and out.
That said, today’s snow was typical spring snow, so we’re keen to get back there deeper in the season to sample more of what this area has to offer.
After skinning back up to the summit of Soshubetsu-dake, we had the gloriously mellow descent back to the main highway to look forward to.
Big wide turns were the flavour of the day, all on beautifully fast and cold cream cheese. We were able to get at least six or seven long turns in before the snow transformed to terribly slow and warm cream cheese.
For the most part, however, so long as we kept in the shade of the trees, the snow was relatively fast.
We jumped from shadow to shadow as we descended, trying our darndest to keep speed up.
We were back at the van within about 45 minutes, and speeding our way back down Nissho Pass to the onsen in Hidaka Town.
At one point, I happened to look to my right as I was driving, and noticed debris from a large wet slide avalanche. Just at the edge of my perception, I thought I saw a large deer at the bottom of the debris. I slammed on the brakes, did a U-turn, and headed back up the road to where we were just across the river from the debris.
Sure enough, there was a large deer sitting at the base of the debris. It moved its head every now and then, but appeared to have it’s legs buried (or broken) in the hard snow. There was nothing we could do but wonder at the long and grisly fate that awaited the poor creature.
“Perhaps he’s just resting,” suggested Haidee, giving us all a dose of glass-half-full on behalf of the beautiful-looking beast.
