This is typical, that when you install a great snow making system, you don't need it for the following season....
Breaking my heart seeing all the mushrooms on cars and houses and other blobs - and not being able to get out there. How long before you return @Sandy? PCR in the US? Iso lifted for Japan?
Haha, some places such as Yuzawa, Fujiwara (Minakami) have had almost 200cm in the past 48 hours. And the altitude of weather stations are lower than the bottom lift stations of the ski resorts in the regions. It's crazy. 200cm in 48 hours might have happened on ski slopes before, but at village level? I don't remember. This is Fujiwara (Minakami). 0cm at 1am of 15th and 193cm at 11pm of 16th, so 193cm in 45 hours. http://www.jma.go.jp/en/amedas_h/today-42046.html?areaCode=000&groupCode=28 Too heavy snow have broken Yuzawa's weather station? I mean, it has stopped recording the snowdepth. http://www.jma.go.jp/en/amedas_h/today-54841.html?areaCode=000&groupCode=39
Back in Japan on Xmas day. No quarantine, but need to submit 14 day itinerary. Tests in the US & on arrival in Japan. New Year probably not worth doing, due to crowds.
Yeah but it is causing some of us an incredible amount of stress. 4 metres in 4 days at Chalet Myoko. Would much rather be there sorting it out.
It seems a tourism association of Kutchan village newly opened a website of "Workcation Niseko" this month. http://workationniseko.com/
Your picture reminds me of this Kei Truck. The payload capacity of Kei Truck is 350kg. I think the amount of snow that the Kei Truck is carrying is heavier than 350kg
After Goto being cancelled I am seeing hotel rooms becoming more available in Niseko, it might be the place to be as its crowd is mainly foreigners
I doubt they'd hire many Australians under 40. A bit of apocryphal evidence around that many schools in Hokkaido won't accept Aussie placements for the JET Program because a handful saw their stint as more skiing (and associated activities) and less teaching.
Harrow School would most likely use the same processes and "hiring fairs" as any of the international schools in Japan, although I'm not sure those fairs would be operating quite as readily in a COVID year (those fairs happen in the first few months of the year, for a start month of June.) There's a bit of competition, but by the same token, there are a lot of international schools in Japan (more than 40, of which most have English as the primary language). And MOST of those teachers from Australia are not primarily in Japan for skiing!! I'd say the range of Aussie teachers I've seen at international school near my home in Yokohama, would be is the range of mid 20s - mid 40s.
Heavy snow leaves hundreds of drivers stuck overnight in their cars on highway in Japan http://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-12-...traffic-hundreds-vehicles-in-niigata/12999892
Somewhere in Tohoku. The region didn't have a very big snowfall unlike Yuzawa, Minakami, etc had but it's a good start, considering it's a week before Christmas.
Under construction, filmed last month before it started snowing. It's opening in August of 2022, so they'll start hiring teachers soon
It's going to be one of the best New Year holidays for a lot of local skiers. It's a good start and most ski resorts have "enjoyable amount of snow" already a week before Christmas. Not only that, an early warning of heavy snow has been issued to ski regions for New Year holiday period (the image below is the early warning). Not only that, people around me are given 17 days of New Year's vacation!, which is usually about 8 days (because of COVID-19, a lot of people are given longer New Year's vacation). It's a road to Tengendai Kogen ski resort in Yamagata. Lower than the bottom ropeway station but plenty of snow a week before Christmas, and more snow is likely to come (JMA forecast so), not bad. That said, I wish we had this amount of snow last year instead. We need to get more foreigners to appreciate Japan's abundant snow so that they'll get to like skiing in Japan and come here to ski repeatedly. The last season was by far the worst season. So far, it's a good start but almost none of tourists from abroad can fly to ski due to COVID-19 Pictures from this weekend.
Pretty much doubling down on what they forecast last month. Although Tohoku gets more and lower Honshu/Kyushu get less. Japan Sea prefectures in central and northern Honshu will do better than Hokkaido.
Due to COVID-19, recently we often hear "Workcation" and "Remote Work". And, some ski resort villages are attracting people related to Workcation and Remote Work. Today, I heard a new strange workcation + ski business. Myoko city, Daihatsu (a Japanese automaker) and NTT (the biggest Japanese telecommunications company) have started a new business "Workcation by use of Kei Truck" in Myoko region, targeting skiers / snowboarders as a trial. Ah, this should be in "Only in Japan" thread?
Mount Racey in Hokkaido has filed for bankruptcy. Pretty sad. https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:6748044214577319936/
Actually, I knew it would come. They were saying "Without Go To Travel campaign, we can't survive this winter". And a few days after it was announced "Go To Travel Campaign will be suspended for a while", Mount Racey officially announced "We won't open this winter". I think Hokkaido is the prefecture which will suffer the most without the campaign. People tend to use such travel campaigns for relatively bigger travels and trip to Hokkaido is kind of "big travel" for most people in Japan (as a domestic travel) All coal mines were closed. JR stopped running a local line to Mount Racey last year. Then now, the hotel went bankrupt. Yes, the real village death is hapenning to Yubari at this rate. Mount Racey is one of ski resorts which we should save. I like Mount Recey. I mean, nearly half of Japanese ski resorts might close by 2035, but Mount Racey is a ski resort worth surviving. Actually, I'm not very worried "yet", though. Yubari city will look for another company to run the business. I mean, they will let the company use the property for free just like they have been doing in recent years. In the last 6 or 7 years was like, a Japanese company - Yubari city - a Japanese company owned by a Chinese company - another Chinese company, then now Yubari city again. Without the ski resort, Yubari city has only one small industry = "the very pricy melon" industry now and I assume Yubari city will try hard to find another Chinese company to run the business there. Edit: I have no intention to discuss about COVID-19 nor Go To Travel campaign here at all, so if you want to, please just write in "COVID-19 in Japan" thread (I don't read the thread at all recently, though).
Haha, the best named ski resort??. Racey comes from the name of the mountain. The ski resort is on 冷水山 = Mt.Reisui. Reisui sounds like Racey and Racey looks nicer / cooler (to Japanese people), so they named the ski resort "Mt.Racey ski resort". By the way, 冷=cold, 水=water, so the name of the mountain means "cold water mountain". Edit: 山 = mountain. In my opinion, whether Racey can survive or not is very up to China. Mt.Racey is relatively close to Hokkaido's international airport and it's somewhere between the international airport and Tomamu, another China owned resort in Central Hokkaido. Actually, the last 2 owners or operators of Mt.Racey were also China related companies. China is hosting winter Olympics for the first time in 2022, which will (I believe) increase winter sports fans in China, which is very important for Mt.Racey (and many others). The population of China is 1.4 billion!. Chinese ski resorts are too dry (most are artificial snow), if they want deep powder, they'll fly to Japan (and actually, Japanse ski resorts are cheaper than major Chinese ski resorts because skiing is still kind of sports for rich people in China, so ski resorts in China tend to be pricy than ski resorts in Japan).
I guess they are half joking. It's a new rent-a-car service. Maybe, a couple rent it, parking it on a river side. One enjoys fishing and the other is working in the Kei-Truck while seeing the beautiful river side view and his / her partner fishing (just an example). Some companies enjoy making new strange ideas become real. I feel it's just one of many "it sounds like a joke, but just give it a try".
What I find frustrating this year is some ski resorts closing particular chairlifts, sometimes these chairs give access to the best part of the mountain. Some of these ski resorts have 99% Japanese visitors anyway, foreigners don't go. The Japanese people who usually travel to Europe or USA to ski probably will not travel to ski abroad this year, so probably they will ski more at home instead, spend more money at Japanese ski resorts instead. So why do these ski resorts cripple themselves by closing their best terrain? I know they are predicting a quiet year, but if I was a local skier I would feel quite sad about it and I would just travel to another close by resort which opens all lifts for better terrain. I plan to ski many small resorts this winter, however I sadly have cancelled my plans to visit a few of them as the good areas will not be accessible. It's like showing up to Disneyland as a kid but the biggest rollercoaster is closed.
The number of Japanese skiing Europe or North America rather than locally would be pretty small. Most Japanese only have short breaks, so will stay local. So I don't see a significant change. I can't recall seeing many Japanese in Austria. Still a few get to NZ in the off season, but nowhere near the numbers 20-30 years ago.
Exactly what I mean, those who usually go to NZ cannot, or could not last winter, so I imagine the ski budget / urge to ski is higher than usual, add to that the amazing conditions so far.. And then small resort closes their best lift! I mean, they only have a few chairlifts, and they just close the best one!? I read Hakuba was busier than usual in shoulder season this year as Japanese prefer to travel domestically.
Zao Onsen's ropeways are usually very crowded with Asian tourists and old Japanese people WITHOUT ski gears. Old people are high risk people, and (most) Asian tourists can't fly this season, so Zao Onsen is a ski resort of my ski regions where I can feel the most significant difference in that almost all people in the ropeways are with ski gears (in average season, more than half in the ropeways are without ski gears). Here are some pictures from Zao Onsen today. From a twitter (filmed at Zao Onsen today)
Japanese government have closed off the country again to all non-residents. Worried about this new strain of Covid coming in apparently. It's just for a month to start. There are some lucky crew around who just snuck in.
