Yesterday rode kokusai with the full crew. Not a whole lot of overnight snow reported, but conditions turned out excellent! The forecast high winds did roll in early afternnoon 14:00 ended up being our last run as they stowed away the gondolas as the winds and snow started whipping around!
Heading out this morning with Fab, overnight had rains in town. Right now tv tower thermometer reported -0.1C. Sunny with clouds sockng in the mountains. Of course the forecast calls for heavy snow starting this afternoon throught tonight and easing tomorrow, when we’re leaving. Never fails!
Author Archive for taro
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the pretty boy thing in Japan seems to be growing pretty strong. There’s been more than a few times where I’ve been wondering, was that a dude or a chick?
If Roy were living in Japan, is this him?
Yesterday was shopping day. Visited Yodobashi & Bic cameras. Japan seems to be big on ions, ion air cleaner like in our room, ion ray gun hair dryer in our bathroom, ion flat screen. Found an awesome kids picture book for J, I’d read it to my kids if I ever had any, “Fun Fun Fu—n!”
Continue reading ‘Kun Kun Kun!’
Yesterday was spent pounding the pow that had fallen overnight. Primo conditions, although we got stuck in a junk spot that took a lot of work to get through. Was an awesome day of riding.
Derek and I found a Bikkuri Donkey in the underground by Odori. Was quite good hamburger steak stuff.
The riding was so good that I have no pictures and by the time we got back was so tuckered out that quickly passed out.
Today is going to be a rest day, no significant new snofall.
Yesterday was spent wandering around town. Tokyu Hands really does sell everything. Lunch was okonomiyaki place on Kitsune Dori, didn’t create too much of a disaster trying to figure out how to do the yakisoba on the teppan at the table.
The hotel is nice, it’s one of the older ones but has been recently renovated. Service is Japan good of course. And I’m in love with the bell portettes. I want to bring luggage everyday!
wake up today to snow starting to fall. Weather report indicates freakin cold! Kokusai here we come!
Made it uneventfully to Sapporo, except at Hawaiian Air the self-check kiosk wouldn’t read my passport so got delayed there. No time for foos at airport, but had time for beer!
Hawaiian flight was good, they included a meal & snack. The level of service & care in actions was not like a Japan run airline though.
Checked in Sapporo Grand Hotel, good location, pretty nice, decent sizewd room, better than the micro room I had when I was here last time by myself, We ran across the street for a quick dirt cheap gyudon/negi tama gyudon meal,
Got a Leki carbon trekking pole with the photo adapter. Figure can use it for multiple purpose of hiking pole and a pole mount for the action cams. Trying out the provided 1/4″ tripod mount adapter with a Giotto mini ball head worked, but it seems a little tenuous. It’s really designed for compact still cameras.
So this is what I came up with. A 3/8″ inner diameter by 1 1/2″ long steel spacer made from rolled sheet, a 3/8″ bolt and wingnut, a hose clamp, thumbscrew, and the mentioned Giotto ball head. The ball head actually has a 3/8×16 threaded hole in it’s base with an adapter to the more common 1/4×20 tripod hole.
Alright, who at GoPro decided to “upgrade” the HD Hero 3’s outer case lens? Who decided to put a glass lens on an extreme action camera? Granted it’s a fairly significant 1/8″ thick, but it’s still glass. I kinda wondered about this when I first got it, I noticed the lens had an optical coating. Not something you saw on the older generation lenses.
I guess this has superior optical clarity, but all the anti-glare coating in the world doesn’t help when you get this!
Yes, I put it in a bad place, that was intentional. In retrospect it was a pretty extreme location as the polycarbonate case has a lot of dings now, but still I’m used to expecting these things to take a beating, that’s the whole point of these cameras, right?
Finally found it at Foodland, pours a light clear yellow with moderate head. Clean crisp fairly dry beer. A little bitter that doesn’t linger very long. Light mouthfeel. Easy drinking, but on the other hand utterly unremarkable. Honestly I don’t think it’s much different than a mass market domestic beer.
Barely 2 out of 4 beer bong monkeys.
The new Sony HDR-AS15 (and presumedly AS10) are nice little POV action video cameras. They produce video about as good as and in some respects better than GoPro’s closest priced competition. But it’s got its share of shortcomings and problems. Some of the shortcomings you would have figured they would have figured out ahead of time by looking at the competition.
There is one problem that has shown up and that is a rattle that is very loud in the on board audio. You can hear it when you shake the camera too. Continue reading ‘Shake Rattle No’