This time, we made our first visit to Grandeco! Though it is already March, snowmonsters haven't been melted!
Climbing in snow is sometimes very difficult, put ourselves in danger, -- but sometimes give us a amazing experience. We joined the backcountry skiing/snowboarding tour in this weekend at Zao area in Yamagata prefecture. Love it!!
Though I don't know the correct English, Yukihatago-Lightning is the festival of lighted reproduced-tavern built by the snow.
A picture is worth a thousand words... This year is 10th anniversary of this festival. Gassan-Shizu onsen flourished as village of Japanese-inn for practitioners of Shindo who headed to Mt. Gassan. Now, the tavern in period building were reproduced by snow.
A shrine.
Snow rabbit.
Charmant Hiuchi snow resort has only three lifts but huge humid snow (high water content) in a day and "not pisted" entirely of its area. Because of its location that is very close to the Sea of Japan, the snow always contain a lot of water.
If you have strong legs, it is worth visiting. At the day we visited, it was a weekday and only 50-100 customers enjoyed fresh-heavy-snow!
Far behind the resort, we could see the mountains near Mt Hiuchi.
One day with a storm of snow, we headed to Hinoemata village.
Snow fell down every time after we arrived with not a moment to spare.
The snow falls continued through the night, and at 6:00 am next morning, the depth of snow reached 70 cm. One night, 70 cm of snow!! It's almost disaster.
It took more than one hour to remove snow falls to drive our car.
No one can walk in this historic deep snow...
Hinoemata village where snow is extremely deep.
If the condition is good for mountain climbing, we can enjoy as follows:
Hinoemata village
Hinoemata-mura, Minamiaizu-gun, FukushimaPrefecture
In the Myoko area, the number of foreign travelers grow steadily in this two-three years. We are Tokyo-based company, but main area of winter activity is in Myoko.
We went Myoko-Maeyama peak hunting - a famous tour course. This mountain area already has enough snow and underbrush has already been buried beneath a covering of snow.
Look at the amount of snowfall... during the daytime... amazing!
There are some large but lesser know resort amongst Westerners in Yamagata prefecture. Zao (in Japanease pronunciation "Za-o-u") is one of the famous village for hot-spring (Zao onsen, Zao hot-spring) in Japan.
There is a JIzou (stone statue of the ancient guardian) on the top of the mountain that is covered by a lot of snow. Strong wind and snow make trees to a snow monster. There are some ski area around this village. This is a wide choice for many different types of skier and snowboarder both in the ski area and back country area.
We enjoyed hot springs in the village, ate yakiniku (steak), and stay in Yamagata city.
On the other day, we visited the Asahi-machi (Asahi town) that places northern part of Yamagata prefecture and is famous for apple-growing area.
In Asahi-machi, there is a very local ski area, Asahi-Sizen-Kan. That was also very good!
Myoko Kogen - Akakura Kanko Resort is our most favorite snow resort that is already famous among powder snow maniac people even abroad. The resort consists of luxury hotel, spa, golf course and ski lifts.
At the beginning of the snow season, the end of December, it is less crowded than high season. We felt as if we are the only customer.
The hotel provides excellent meal and breakfast. We love to stay this hotel and recommend you to stay here confidently!!
Nikko-Shiranesan is 2,578 m high mountain and is located on the border of Pref. Gunma and Pref. Tochigi in Japan.
Marunuma Kogen Ski Resort is a small to medium in size with 8 lifts and 1 ropeway. During the summer, the ski resort is a good access route for the hiking to Nikko-Shiranesan, and is also famous for a summer skiing. From Numata IC (Numata exit) of Kan-etsu Expressway, it is a 1 hour journey
along Road 120.
