I need regular trips, not a big one.
20 July 2018
So after some calculations, decided that since I really do plan to focus more of my long trips on snowboarding, I should buy my equipment instead of renting during my upcoming trip to Toronto.
The math goes like this:
Rental of helmet, snowboard, snowboarding boots and bindings (the last three usually referred to collectively in rental shops as "snowboard") costs S$25 a day even in a relatively cheap country like Korea for the beginners, and $50 or more for the better equipment in the more expensive countries.
Buying all four during sales like the one the Canadian store Sanctions is having right now costs about $800 since CAD and SGD are almost 1:1.
Example cart as shown. These can last beyond my beginner days, in theory.
Assuming I stay at the beginner level for a very long time, it will take me 32 days to make it the same as renting in Korea all the way, or almost 5 weeks, or three 2-week snowboarding trips.
In addition to these, I'll need a snowboard bag which can easily be found on Taobao or Aliexpress for around S$50 instead of $90-150 in stores.
Cons:
- Have to check luggage rules before booking every flight. Lots of airlines now consider the entire snowboard bag as one piece of luggage at the maximum allowed weight for a single piece of luggage, ie even if it's just 10kg, it will be treated as 23kg, and if you're flying on a fare that only allows a single bag, you'd better be able to stuff everything in your snowboard bag.
- Chances are the cheapest flights don't provide suitable luggage allowance.
- Got to check/wear the snowboarding boots once in a while.
- Got to learn to maintain the board personally since there is no way there is even a single shop in Singapore offering board maintenance services.
- Got to lug everything, wheeled bag or no, so snowboarding trips will really be all about snowboarding and not much else.
- Can't try out new boards.
- Miss out on freebies rental stores sometimes offer, like free transfers.
Pros:
- Comfortable boots. I had a terrible time wearing ill-fitting ski boots in Niseko that made my ankle ache within 10 minutes of wearing them, but they were the best the rental store had to offer.
- Clean boots. Do you see anyone inside or outside rental stores cleaning boots? It might happen when you aren't around... or it might not.
- Consistent board makes for easier learning since it skips the part where the snowboarder has to adapt to the new equipment at the beginner of each trip.
- Magne-Traction. Don't think they rent boards with that out at beginner prices.
- Comfortable helmet. There have been situations where the biggest helmets available can barely fit me.
- Lighter, more flexible boards. Makes sense for rental shops to offer sturdy, heavy boards for durability, doesn't make as much sense for the users. My rented snowboard in Austria was pretty heavy and worn, tbh.
- I might wear the boots to go out and save $100 from not having to get snow boots.
- I can go straight to the accommodation from the airport instead of having to take a detour to the rental store, and make sure it happens during office hours. The same for the end to return the equipment. Usually I finish early just so that I can return them on the penultimate day just to avoid the trouble of rushing everything on the last day and the cost of another day's rental fee.
- After 32 days of snowboarding, whatever is still usable might as well be free.
Anyway it looks like villas with private pools are trending in Phuket. It's easy to find one under S$150 a night, and some even go as low as $67 a night but without housekeeping and front desk. That's really just a private home but if they call it a villa, I'll say it's a villa. Going to try one out that's about S$100 a night and has a pool that looks big enough to swim in in Sept.
Want to go snowboarding in late Jan till mid Feb to return in time for Chinese New Year. Hotels in Yongpyong aren't opening up their rooms for reservation during that period though, while the rooms in the nearby village look inconvenient despite the proximity.
Might go if it's possible to keep the cost of the entire trip under S$3000 excluding snowboarding equipment.
