It’s always great to get feedback from our past seasonaires and we recently caught up with Graham who joined us for the full 12 week season in Hakuba to get the low down on his adventure and winter season in Japan with us!
Snow Season Japan: What made you want to spend a season in Japan?
Graham: “I wanted a change from trips to Europe and to experience a different culture and ski deep powder.”
Snow Season Japan: What were the highlights of your season in Hakuba?
Graham: “Too many to mention! A main highlight was meeting so many friendly people at the lodge.”
Snow Season Japan: What else did you see in Japan?
Graham: “Nozawa Onsen Fire Festival which was one of the craziest things I’ve ever seen, Snow Monkeys, Matsumoto, Nagano, Kanazawa, Tokyo, Kyoto, Nara, Sumo wrestling, K1. Tokyo was my favourite place, it was very weird at first but it grew on me – such a crazy, but very safe place. There’s so many people, but they are all so friendly… the total opposite to London.”
Snow Season Japan: Describe your best day skiing in Japan.
Graham: “Getting up early after it had dumped during the night and then going to all the places only you know about with a couple of friends and skiing fresh tracks.”
Snow Season Japan: What did you like most about Japan?
Graham: “How safe everywhere was… I didn’t lock the door to my room all season! Also how friendly and helpful all Japanese people seemed to be.”
Snow Season Japan: What did you find most surprising about Japan, Japanese culture and people?
Graham: “How easy it was to get around and how Japanese people always wanted to help with giving directions even though we both had no idea what we were saying to each other!”
Snow Season Japan: How was the Japanese language course?
Graham: “It was ideal for learning all the basic greetings and phrases. Japanese people were very surprised and pleased when you made the smallest effort to speak their language. I can still read some Katakana letters now if I see some things written in Japanese in England.”
Snow Season Japan: What did you really enjoy about Hakuba in particular?
Graham: “An awesome mix of terrain at the resorts. Sauce Bar in Goryu. Hakuba was a good base location for exploring other parts of Japan and Tokyo was only 4 hours away. If you were doing a season in Hokkaido, all these places are much further away.”
Snow Season Japan: Overall did you enjoy you winter with Snow Season Japan in Hakuba?
Graham: “Yes! All the advice from Sarah and Andy over the season was a great help.”
Check out these photos from Graham’s winter season in Hakuba with us! As well as skiing every day, Graham took the opportunity to travel around Japan and we helped him along the way booking tickets, transport, hotels and making recommendations for him.
View from Graham’s room in the lodge… what a view to wake up to each morning all winter long!
The famous and very crazy… Nozawa Onsen Fire Festival, which takes places annually and is included in all our January trips.
Huge freshly caught Tuna at Tsukiji Fish Market in Tokyo.
View from Hakuba 47 Resort.
Wild Japanese monkey playing with snow on our trip to the Snow Monkey Onsen at Jigokudani.
Mixed in with all that ancient tradition comes Japan’s super high tech side and Bullet Trains or Shinkansen, as they are known in Japanese. You can travel from Hakuba to Tokyo in as little as 2.5 hours!
Graham settling in for the night in one of Tokyo’s Capsule Hotels.
Sumo wrestling!
Kinkakuji (The Golden Temple) in Kyoto.
Walking back to the lodge through deep snow! So beautiful.
Places on our 4, 8 and 12 week winter season trips to Hakuba in Japan’s Northern Alps are limited and filling up faster than usual for the 2011 season – you’ll find lots of details on our website and if you have any questions or would like to book, just drop Andy and Sarah a line at info@snowseasonjapan.com
We’re looking forward to another awesome winter season with lots of deep powder and amazing culture!
Check out the trailer for ‘Falling Skies’ a ski documentary by British film maker Nic Watkins of Run Jump Fly Productions. Nic made this film during the 2009 winter season, and we came across it again the other day, so thought we’d share it with you on our blog… because it’s so good!
Andy & Sarah from Snow Season Japan showed Nic and the crew around Hakuba and Myoko on their Japan trip during the 2009 winter season. There’s lots of footage from all over Europe in there, but watch out for the unmistakable deep Japanese powder scenes of British skiers Beanie Milne Home, Ed Waite and French skier Nicolas Cruz Mermy smashing through the powder past silver birch trees. And look out for the Japanese snow monkeys sitting in an natural onsen hot spring, followed by a Kamoshika (wild mountain goat / deer native to Japan) about 3 minutes in.
Nic Watkins and the crew were also joined by photographer Camilla Stoddart. We first met Camilla in Japan back in 2008, and she’s been back every year since. She has some awesome galleries of her Japan snow trips – check out some of her powder action shots (see if you can spot Andy from Snow Season Japan jibbing a vending machine!) and also some of her brilliant cultural travel images from her time in Japan.
Check out this video made by some of the local Japanese snowboarders in Hakuba during the 2010 winter season. It shows some of the awesome terrain you can access in Hakuba, as well as all that powder. Deep powder, epic tree riding, big lines… we’re so excited about winter 2011!
It features Gaku Oishi, our good friend and local rider. He rides powder by day and by night he runs an awesome traditional izakaya style restaurant/bar in Hakuba called Mangetsudo. The bar name means ‘full moon’ in Japanese and on each full moon Gaku throws a party which usually involves Nomi/Tabe Hodai, which means – all you can eat and drink, for a fixed price!
It might be the middle of summer, but it’s never too early to start thinking about buying new gear for the coming winter season. Whether you are a gear junkie or a first time buyer, new snow toys will certainly get you stoked on winter! 2011 model skis and snowboards are starting to come into the shops now and we’ve teamed up Freeze Pro Shop in Edinburgh to give all our Snow Season Japan customers a discount. That’s right – 10% OFF all gear for everyone who has booked a 2011 winter season trip to Hakuba with us. Not sure what you are after? Need some advice? Just ask the friendly at Freeze. And the best part? They deliver right to your door.
So what are you waiting for?! Sign up with us for a season of non stop powder and unique culture, enjoy an awesome discount on new gear at Freeze Proshop… then sit back, relax and dream of powder.
We are pretty sure the Japanese invented festivals, full stop. Go anywhere in Japan, any time of the year and you are sure to run into a festival of some description. Our absolute favourite is the Nozawa Onsen Fire Festival – year after year it’s quite simply a mind blowing experience you will never forget. And if you come on a Snow Season Japan trip which falls on January you’ll be lucky enough to experience this for yourself!
Last weekend we checked out a local festival in Nagano city – home to the 1998 Winter Olympics and the ancient Zenkoji Temple – located about 50 minutes away from Hakuba. Here’s a few snaps and you can check out more on the Snow Season Japan Facebook page.
The new mountain bike park and trails at Hakuba 47 mountain resort are now OPEN! This is the first time lift accessed downhill mountain biking has been available in the Hakuba valley, so we are super stoked. Check out this awesome video of the new trails.
Ever wondered what Hakuba looks like in the middle of summer without all that snow? During winter the village is quite literally buried under metres and metres of snow, no complaints here! By May all the snow at village level has melted, but the ski resorts are still open with limited lift operation until the end of the Golden Week holidays. Now we’re into July and the village is lush and a patchwork of flourishing rice fields… green season is go!
So what do we get up to in Hakuba during summer when we’re not dreaming of powder and all things winter? Lots! Mountain biking, hiking, swimming in the lake, canyoning, kayaking…
Without a doubt, one of the best things about spending a winter season in Japan is experiencing and trying lots of different Japanese foods. Japan has one of the world’s most unique cuisines… and in no time you will be slurping soba noodles with the best of them and mastering chopsticks like a pro!
Fear not however, there is plenty of western food available in Hakuba – you’ll find lots of home comforts in the supermarket and a great selection of restaurants right on your doorstep. A highlight of our trips is the end of season Sushi Party, when we all get together and make our own sushi!
Lunch boxes, known as ‘Bento’ in Japanese, are very popular – check out this one we had the other day: Teriyaki chicken, rice, salad, sashimi, sushi, tempura… all washed down with a bowl of super healthy miso soup. Yum!
We were recently featured on a very cool action sports buying guide website, AWSM.com
We love what these guys had to say: “I think Japan has the greatest snow on earth – not Utah. It also happens to be one of the coolest places on the planet to experience. Storms just slam into the island nation all winter long, bringing neck deep powder with them. This, coupled with incredible terrain features & amazing people, make it a favorite exotic snowboard destination.”
Japanese riders, filmers and photographers have been blowing us away recently with their amazing productions. Check out the trailers for these upcoming Japanese snowboard films. Warning… watching these will make you want to quit your office job!
This teaser is for famous Japanese snowboarder Tadashi Fuse’s Heart Films Volume 4 featuring some seriously sick riding from Japan’s top snowboarders.
We LOVE the title of this one: ‘Endless Snow’. Sums up winter in Japan very well we think! Stoked yet?
