My friend Andre who lived across the valley was looking to get out on a ski tour and once we saw a small weather window we went out to Suginahara on the North side of Myoko Kogen and purchased a one time only Gondi ticket and were off for a camping trip on the crater Rim of Myoko. The forecast called of the occasional showers but after a few minute clearing of weather we were in a White out skinning to and putting up camp.

By around midnight the weather cleared but the winds raged and shook our tent as we enjoyed that we built a meter deep shelter to put our tent into, giving us some shelter from the winds.

The next morning Andre and I got up before sunrise and waited to watch an epic sunrise of the crater rim of a volcano.

Looking into Myoko San, the summit of the volcanic complex and a mountain within a mountain.

We chose our camp spot for two reasons, the views and it was the least built up cornice spot on the ridge where we were able to dig up to the edge and have a great view point.

Watching the sunrise over Huiguchi and Yakiyama to the north.

Soon we were enjoying the rays of light warming us up and preparing us to put on our cold snowboarding gear all the while cooking Gyoza for breakfast.

Soon enough we broke down our camp and  came up with a plan for the day. We studied the maps and made a decision to ride into the crater and check out some spots marked as Onsens on the map before riding down to Akakura Onsen ski resort on the West side of the Myoko complex.

One last view of the Myoko crater before getting our boards together and filling our backpacks with all of our overnight gear.

We were fortunate that there was about 10cm’s of new snow within the crater so we found semi good dust on crust conditions riding the steep headwall.

We followed the main crater drainage for a while until we were close to a massive drop with the obvious smoldering of a volcanic crater so with a 30 minute bootpack we were back on another safe ridge to ride around the “Onsen” section and looking at the Western headwall of Myoko San.

After a easy descent in a few cms of snow we made it around the “Onsen” on the map and were happy that we decided to climb as the area was riddled in cliffs but it was obvious we weren’t going to soak in them as it was way too hot.

We stopped at an emergency shelter hut and met two Japanese guys who were Splitboarding the same run we were heading for and were familiar with the terrain so we joined forces for the final descent.

It was awesome running into two people in the Japanese Splitboarding scene as it seems very popular within the culture.

We looked at them in envy as they had day packs compared to our weighted down overnight packs as we traversed around numerous gullies before finally settling on the right one that would bring us down to the resort.

Here is Andre riding down with a heavy pack.

Finally we made it to a spot that with a 15 minute skin we were in Akakura Ski Resort and riding a mile long easy groomer down to the car park. We were on the left ridge just below the summit and hiked just above the cliff band.

We all smashed into a K car and made the 15 minute drive back to Suginahara where two cars were waiting and by around 2p.m. we were back at our car and heading home.

I made it back to the resort an hour before closing and took a Gondola lap where I was able to see Myoko in the distance. It was good that we had left when we did as weather had come in again swallowing the summit crater. It was an awesome trip and it was a beautiful sunrise that I’m sure both Andre and I enjoyed, thanks for being a great partner and sharing the trip with me.