There are a few reasons that Japan kicks a lot of ass as a ski destination.
It's not just the skiing - although it's great - that keeps drawing me back there.
Actually, it kind of is. I mean, Niigata which is just an hour or
two out of Tokyo by Shin-Kansen (bullet train) had fantastic snowfall
on the couple of times I skied there. At least a foot of fresh snow
every night I was there! One one evening it was closer to three foot!
Another
of the great things are the skiing habits of the Japanese public. For
some reason, they only like to ski where others have skied before them.
That means that on most runs, there will be a 5 meter wide trail of
well-tracked snow that everybody follows. Right next to that track is
often a couple of acres of virgin powder that nobody has even touched -
a scenario that seems to last at least until early afternoon, by which
time the Japanese skiers have started to follow the few foreigners onto
the good stuff. Of course, there aren't that many foreigners where we
went so a few times we were even getting to lay fresh tracks on the
last run of the day!
One thing that kind of bugged me though was chairlift etiquette.
Even if there were 200 people waiting for a lift up the mountain, the
locals will only ever get on a chairlift if they know the other people
on the lift - even if it means one person goes up in a quad! That is in
stark contrast to other places I have skied where the chairlifts are a
great place to make new friends.
But then again, there ARE Onsens. Onsen is the Japanese hotspring
and they are a damn fine thing at the end of a hard day of skiing. Just
the thing for tired muscles and bruised egos. (Be sure you're carrying travel accident insurance like World Nomads!)
The funny thing
too, is that although Japan is generally a pretty expensive place,
skiing in Japan is actually cheap - especially if you organise it with
a Japan based agent. I had a couple of 4 day trips with everything
included - transport ex-Tokyo, hire, accommodation, passes, food,
ski-gear etc for about $350 which I was pretty happy with.
So happy in fact that I am going back again real soon! ;)
