Japanuary 2024 - the trip that nearly wasn't

[OZDUCK]

Skiing, Skiing and More Skiing - Plus Some Food and an Onsen - Wednesday 24 January 2024

Up early, breakfast and on the 0830 shuttle to the Gondola (about 3 mins by car, but a long walk uphill in ski boots!)

We bought 2 x senior (60+) lift and lunch tickets for a total of ¥11,200 (Wednesday special) - this is less than $120. Other days ¥12,000 for the two of us. Non-senior price ¥7,300 per person per day, and kids ¥4,800 per day. This includes a ¥1000 voucher towards lunch, and you just pay the difference if your total is more. So cheap. A single day ticket walk up like this at Perisher last season was over $200 - yes I know it's cheaper if you buy a pass, but I want to compare apples with apples. So for 60% of the cost of a single day in Australia (where the snow cannot compare) for one person, we got 2 people, excellent snow, no lift lines other than the initial gondola, plus lunch. So happy!

Skiing conditions a mixed bag. 40 cm of fresh snow . Windy . Poor visibility . But that snow!!!! And a good temperature at -8.

View attachment 373128

Delicious lunch . Overall, an excellent day.

This is what ¥1,200 (=13) will buy you for lunch.
View attachment 373127
At the end of the day, I walked to the public onsen in heavy falling snow (beautiful) and channeled my inner @OZDUCK by immediately slipping over on an icy road. No damage done, other than to pride, thank goodness. But actually quite hilarious that the only fall I took after a day of solid skiing in poor visibility was on the walk to the onsen at the end of the day.

Ate at the hotel bar - kara age chicken and wedges with sour cream and chilli and called it a day before 8 pm.

Hey, I fall over on dry roads/footpaths with unexpected kerbs/steps. My wife fell over in the snow and ice! Please keep up the great story and pictures.

 

[Seat0B]

Will I or Won't I? - Thursday 25 January 2024

My thought process today:

0630 - oooh I hear snow clearing. It must have snowed a fair bit overnight. I can't wait to go skiing.
0700 - out of bed and open the curtains. Oooooh it's snowing. How awesome. Looks like 20-30 cm overnight. I can't wait to go skiing.
0701 - OMG my legs are sore. And my arms. And my ribs. And my neck. And my calves. Oh my calves!! Maybe I won't go skiing today.
0702 - on my, listen to the wind howl. It's very windy out there.
0705 - snow forecast. Heavy snow. Yeah, I'm skiing. In poor visibility (oh yuck) and near gale force winds gusting to 50 km/hr. Maybe I won't ski.
0755 - I don't remember there being so many stairs here in the lodge yesterday.
0800- Temperature at top of gondola -10˚C - plus wind chill. maybe I won't ski.
0830 - official resort notice - all gondolas and chairlifts at Yamabiko, Uenotaira and Paradise ate closed due to high winds. Yeah, nah. No skiing or us today. I am slightly relieved.

I am usually very well prepared for my ski holidays - in fact it is just about my sole motivation to go to the gym. So I do not usually suffer so much from sore muscles on Day 2. But of course with chemo and recovery time only since mid-September, I am certainly not at my fittest. In the end I was quite glad to have "mountain closed" as the reason to rest up a bit today.

So now to plan a different day in Nozawa Onsen. Made a few personal and work calls. Did a load of washing. And then took a nice walk in heavy falling snow up town and checked out the cooking onsen (only open to villagers):



...and then the beautiful shrine - a meaningful place to me as this was where was when I received the first news of Seat Granddaughter's impending arrival (back in February 2020 - oh the pre-COVID lightness of being!!!). Now always make an expression of gratitude for her safe arrival any time I am here.


Bought some local crafts and a packet of recycled kimono silk fabric (for crafts or quilting). Had a nice long onsen.

Followed by a very early dinner/late lunch at Genki Burger at 1645. Our order was 2 x Yamabiko B (meat, bacon, tomato, lettuce, slaw and sauce) 1 x chunky fries, 1 x beer, 1 x lemon sour and it was all ¥3,700 (well less than $40) and as delicious as I remembered. Their fries are always so crunchy!


Walked home in more heavy snow fall, and went to bed early in expectations of a great ski day tomorrow. Hopefully the soak in the onsen will have eased my sore muscles enough that I can ski.

 

[Seat0B]

What a Great Ski Day - Friday 26 Jan 2024

Some early dramatic clouds followed by a lovely blue sky, no wind, 20 cm fresh powder and cold without being crazy cold. That's my kind of ski day! A few shots to bring you along for the ride!




Yamabiko was finally opened, but a victim of its own success as it was crazy busy, with way too many people, a lot of whom were just straightlining it and quite a fe that did not have the skills for this part of the mountain. It was a bit scary in patches. The crowds started to thicken as the Tokyoites arrived getting ready for the weekend.

Lunch was yakitori don - thnly sliced pork with sweet soy, cabbage and ice, miso soup and the local specialty nozawana pickles (burdock - a bitter leafy green), washed down with several cups of hōjicha - a roasted green tea with a delicious sweet nutty, slightly smoky flaviur that tastes nothing like green tea.

DInner was bar snacks, as too stuffed to move after skiing my legs off! A great day.

 

[Seat0B]

I Take the Weekend Off - Saturday 27 Jan 2024

Following my doctor's advice not to push too hard, listening to my body and keen to avoid the weekend crowds from Tokyo, I awarded myself the weekend off. And Mr Seat 0A kept me company, bless him!

Caught the bus down to Iiyama to visit the big supermarket there to buy snacks and drinks to take to Shiga Kogen next week. Shiga Kogen is a skier's paradise, but very poor on the food options.

The Saturday departure crowds were huge and we felt privileged that the bus driver let us wait in the bus and avoid the crowds, snug and warm from the falling snow - probably because we did not have luggage, or maybe because I had asked politely in Japanese as it was powdering down snow (which you can see drifting down if you look hard at the photos).




The line to join the bus was literally out of the bus terminal plaza and down the road to the next corner (see the yellow arrow). And so many Aussies caught out by the requirement for coins or notes (actual money) to buy the bus ticket from the vending machine. Some very stressed people with useless debit/credit cards!



Whilst in Iiyama, we visited a local museum called Furasato Hall that highlighted the importance of snow in the history of the area, and the use of straw as a resource. Surprisingly, we were allowed to interact with these items - touch them and look up close. Those people from older times were certainly hardy, ingenious and resourceful.



The staff were so excited to see us! It was quite touching really. I think we may have been their only visitors for the whole day. Certainlhy there was no one else there when we were.

We also saw a spectacular display of beautiful gowns made from washi paper. These were amazing. The artists first made their own paper, and then designed and made the gowns. They were absolutely gorgeous. So delicate and beautiful. Look at the detail particularly in the pink petal gown.



After stocking up on groceries, we caught the bus back to Nozawa Onsen. Much quieter in that direction!



Then out for early dinner at Tonkichi, a little izakaya style place near our hotel. Mr Seat 0A captured this shot of the waitress beaming at me as I successfully ordered in Japanese, including all the tricky counters for the number of drinks (ippai, nihai, sanbai...). I felt very successful!



A lovely, low key day. Just the rest the doctor ordered.

 

[Seat0B]

The Slopes are Calling Me - Sunday 28 January 2024

I was feeling good after my rest day yesterday, so onto the slopes I headed. Roamed the mountain. Viz continued to be poor, but the snow was in magnificent condition and the crowds were much less, especially after lunch when people obviously started heading back to Tokyo. Nothing much specific to report today except a magnificent day of skiing, a delicious late lunch on the slopes at Hakugin (probably my favourite place to eat on the whole mountain) followed by and onsen and bar snacks for dinner.

Photos of my happy place. I love, love, love snow trees. And there were plenty.

 

[Seat0B]

Another Rest Day for Me - Monday 29 Jan 2024

Hard as it is, I am really trying not to overdo things. I am still feeling very easily tired, and definitely not up to my usual levels of energy, which is not really surprising. So again today I chose a rest day. Sent Mr Seat 0A off for a day of skiing without me. It was sunny and gorgeous weather, and on his return, he reported a fabulous day of spectacular skiing with no crowds and totally knackered from skiing runs and then straight onto the lift with literally no waiting time at all! I'm glad he went. He got to ski to his own pace and on some of the less groomed steeps that I am not overly keen on.

I had a leisurely morning around the lodge, did some washing and then went up town. The walk was so beautiful - sun shining, snow all around, blue sky. Uplifting.

I visited my favourite onsen, Nakao no yu. It was completely empty. So, in brazen contravention of the rules, I was able to take a few photos. It could kindly be described as "rustic" or "authentic" and I absolutely love it.




After a good soak, I headed right into town and got an Australian style coffee at St Anton's for ¥650 and sat for a while. Then I bought a miso kabocha (miso pumpkin) oyaki and an azuki (sweet red bean) oyaki for ¥500 total for my lunch.

A very pleasant way to spend a non-skiing day.

 

[Seat0B]

Biggest Day Ever - Tuesday 30 Jan 2024

Well, what a great day. According to my SkiTracks app, it's the biggest day I've had in terms of distance skied since I started recording in 2016 - 30 km, 20 runs, and 54.2 km/hr top speed (that's not my fastest).

Totally fantastic day spent mostly on Yamabiko. Blue skies everywhere, although the snow trees are starting to lose their cover with the last few warm days and no fresh snow. Snow cover is mostly still OK, although starting to get a bit scraped in the more popular areas. I was somewhat overdressed for the temperatures today, and was a total sweat ball by the end of the day.



Some more snow tree shots.

 

[Seat0B]

Last Day - Wednesday 31 January 2024

Our family has the motto "always leave wanting more", so we both decided not to ski today. In truth, it would be hard to top yesterday. The blazing sun is impacting the snow cover. I am tired - my stamina is clearly lacking. We both have business to attend to (a small downside of being self employed).
So we worked in the morning, then had an onsen, a coffee up town:


Another onsen in a different one, and dinner at Tonkichi again.





Interspersed with a bit of packing as tomorrow we will move on to Shiga Kogen

 

[drron]

What a beautiful and uplifting TR. Good for you.

 

[Seat0B]

What a beautiful and uplifting TR. Good for you.

Thanks @drron. I was so grateful to be there. I honestly did not think this trip would happen, given all the health drama, and that gave me the chance to realise how much I love skiing, how much I love Japan as a destination, and how much I particularly love skiing in Japan. It's good for me writing it up too - I am reliving the delight and joy of each day's events again as I write.

 

[Seat0B]

Transit Nozawa Onsen to Shiga Kogen - Thursday 1 Feb 24

Transit via Nagano Snow Shuttle very straight forward. Left Nozawa at 1040, hubbed through Nagano Oyaki Farm again and arrived in Shiga Kogen to Prince Hotel East at 1315.

Used my very best elementary Japanese to disavow to the concierge that we had any connection to the large, noisy group of JetStar bogan snow boarders also disembarking from the snow shuttle and found myself whisked away to the priority check in line, where I was immediately served by an immaculate young lady with excellent English that she was obviously proud to show off to me. So I didn't need any of my carefully learnt lines about how many people (ni mei sama), how many nights (nana haku) or paying by credit card .

And in the one and only time it worked out for us on this trip, we were immediately allowed to go to our room, even though it was only 1330 and check in wasn't until 1500.

I took a few photos of the room this time. It's very spacious, perfect for a week of skiing.
Two massively large single beds that we pushed together to make a "more than King"


And a lovely Japanese style bathroom with a deep ofuro style bath that nearly makes up for the lack of an onsen at the hotel.


View from the picture window is spectacular.



And even the car park view is lovely.



It's ski in-ski out and I can't wait for tomorrow. Although it was disappointingly hot today at 5 degrees in Nagano, and only just around zero on arrival here. We noticed the lack of snow compared to other years on the trip up here. Anyway, it will be what it will be. After two rest days, I'm all charged up and ready to go.

 

[Seat0B]

I Ski My Legs Off - Shiga Kogen Friday 2 Feb 24-Wednesday 7 Feb 24

Made a few slightly later starts, taking full advantage of the absolute ski in-ski out location of the Prince East Hotel.

Over the ski days, we had a mix of beautiful crisp clear blue days, some overcast, poor visibility days and a couple of days when it just gently powdered down snow the whole day. Overnight temps were in the range of -10 to -12 degrees, and by the time we reached the top of Gondola #1 each day it was usually around -8 or -10. I know this sounds cold, but when there is little wind, this is an ideal skiing temperature.

The days soon settled into a lovely pattern - on the slopes about 0930 to put in a few turns on crunchy, hard, fast groomers (except for the couple of days it snowed overnight, when we had boot deep powder). After warming up, roam all over the huge mountain, taking in the amazing, spectacular, awesome, stunning, fantastic (runs out of superlative here) views. The a morning coffee and pastry stop about 1130, more skiing until late lunch at about 1400, then out again about 1445 to ski home from wherever we were, arriving back between 1545 and 1630 each day depending on the distance we had to commute. Then put a load of sweaty ski clothes through the wash, had a long hot soak in the bath, and a snack dinner in our room. Rinse and repeat.

I love Shiga Kogen as a ski resort. Fantastic views. Spectacular snow trees. Long runs, with varied terrain - some parts wide and open and perfect for sweeping carved turns, other places runs between the trees, some steep pinches suited to pedalling,rhythmic, short radius turns and not a single lift line, anywhere, ever, for the whole week. Literally ski straight on to the lift every single time.

I'll let the photos tell the story. Cold morning temperatures kept the snow in good condition.



Fabulous views.



Snow trees. Big snow trees.




Same gondola - different visibility. Beautiful even in bad visibility.




Grooming the powder.

 

[Seat0B]

Food at Shiga Kogen - Feast or Famine

Breakfast
Our hotel, Prince East, offered a buffet breakfast for ¥4,000 ($40) per person. We did not think that was value, so as we knew about this from prior trips, we took porridge sachets and UHT milk and added some local dried fruit and nuts bought on our Iiyama shopping trip, plus a tub of yoghurt bought at the konbini in Ichinose (the "village" part of Shiga Kogen).

Morning Tea
Each day we stopped and had a pastry and a coffee (using this word loosely - it was all but impossible to get anything resembling a flat white) for about ¥1,000 each. Here's Mr Seat0A looking pretty happy with his handiwork as we converted an Americano (awful Kona drip-style coffee) into something like a flat white, one tub of creamer at a time . We even resorted to drinking the hot tinned coffee from the vending machines on occasion.




Lunch

This was the feast part! We were able to enjoy excellent lunches for ¥1,500 or less every day. Here is a selection of our meals. That Biminbap was so good I had it twice!



Dinner

Our hotel offered a buffet dinner for ¥8,800 ($90) per person. We did not think that was value at all so opted not to eat at the hotel.

Our choices then revolved around catching the shuttle bus up to Ichinose and trying to get a meal at one of the only 2 restaurants still operating post-COVID, which we did one night for teppanyaki (¥3,500 per person no photos sorry) or snacking in our room, which we did every other night. Here's an example of our snack dinner, which we washed down with cold beers from the vending machine, or hard lemonade, or hot or cold tea. Not too bad after the lunches we ate every day.

 

[Seat0B]

Rest Day
Following doctor's orders and listening to my body, I had a rest day on Saturday 3 Feb. I find it is always a good option to skip a Saturday, as all the resorts we visited are in easy weekend range of Tokyo and Saturdays can be very busy. Mr Seat 0A decided to keep me company, so we slept in, and then caught the town shuttle bus down to Ichinose where we made a raid on the local konbini. We bought 4 nice apples, some mandarines, a couple of katsu sandwiches for dinner and a karaage chicken bento, some choc chip melon bread, sachets of hot chocolate powder and yoghurt. This will nicely round out our in-house catering.

Lunch was pork miso soup in the basement of Gondola #1. ¥850 each. Very reasonable.

After lunch we caught the town shuttle in the opposite direction in falling snow up to Okushiga and had a coffee (best we found at Shiga Kogen, from a Nespresso style machine) and a pastry at our favourite lunch spot there, St Christoph. By late afternoon the snow was falling heavily and we were really excited about skiing the next day with fresh snow and fresh ski legs. In fact, we woke to 30 cm of fresh powder!!!

The hotel left some umbrellas at the bus stop for guest convenience in the falling snow.



And I was thrilled to be able to read most of this sign (they are place names and all in Kanji, and it's a good challenge), although I did have to ask for a bit of help from an older gentleman also waiting at the bus stop.

 

[DaveinCanberra]

Outstanding report - many thanks - super useful.

 

[pagingjoan]

Outstanding report - many thanks - super useful.

Agree.
I am definitely not a skier but enjoyed the report immensely, and am so happy that you could make the trip and that it went so well, SeatOB.
Full points to you.

 

[rbjhan]

Transit Nozawa Onsen to Shiga Kogen - Thursday 1 Feb 24

Transit via Nagano Snow Shuttle very straight forward. Left Nozawa at 1040, hubbed through Nagano Oyaki Farm again and arrived in Shiga Kogen to Prince Hotel East at 1315.

Used my very best elementary Japanese to disavow to the concierge that we had any connection to the large, noisy group of JetStar bogan snow boarders also disembarking from the snow shuttle and found myself whisked away to the priority check in line, where I was immediately served by an immaculate young lady with excellent English that she was obviously proud to show off to me. So I didn't need any of my carefully learnt lines about how many people (ni mei sama), how many nights (nana haku) or paying by credit card .

And in the one and only time it worked out for us on this trip, we were immediately allowed to go to our room, even though it was only 1330 and check in wasn't until 1500.

I took a few photos of the room this time. It's very spacious, perfect for a week of skiing.View attachment 373374
Two massively large single beds that we pushed together to make a "more than King"
View attachment 373376

And a lovely Japanese style bathroom with a deep ofuro style bath that nearly makes up for the lack of an onsen at the hotel.
View attachment 373375

View from the picture window is spectacular.

View attachment 373377View attachment 373378

And even the car park view is lovely.

View attachment 373379

It's ski in-ski out and I can't wait for tomorrow. Although it was disappointingly hot today at 5 degrees in Nagano, and only just around zero on arrival here. We noticed the lack of snow compared to other years on the trip up here. Anyway, it will be what it will be. After two rest days, I'm all charged up and ready to go.

Just a small correction, sama 様 is the keigo used to address customer or someone of higher rank. But under no circumstance anybody should be calling themselves sama.
When asked 何名様ですが? Simple answer is ふたりです。

I am not an expert of keigo in any way (N4 at best), my simple rule is I don't use keigo since I am almost always the customer in Japan. Normal polite form teineigo 丁寧語 (the desu/masu form) is enough.

 

[Seat0B]

Just a small correction, sama 様 is the keigo used to address customer or someone of higher rank. But under no circumstance anybody should be calling themselves sama.
When asked 何名様ですが? Simple answer is ふたりです。

I am not an expert of keigo in any way (N4 at best), my simple rule is I don't use keigo since I am almost always the customer in Japan. Normal polite form teineigo 丁寧語 (the desu/masu form) is enough.

Thanks so much @rbjhan - I had wondered about this - whether it was the same as calling yourself ‘san’ which is also not done. So probably lucky I didn’t get to use it!!!

 

[rbjhan]

Thanks so much @rbjhan - I had wondered about this - whether it was the same as calling yourself ‘san’ which is also not done. So probably lucky I didn’t get to use it!!!

There is sooo much keigo being used when talking to restaurant/konbini /ryokan & hotel staff, I had some really hard times understanding them
Finally learned keigo this year....and I'm slowly getting the hang of it!

 

[fly2earth]

Background

Back in March 2023, we were fresh home from our COVID delayed trip to ski in Japan that we finally got to do in January/February 2023. It was fabulous and so when the then QF DSC offer landed in March 2023, we decided to just do it all again! We had paid about $4,500 in total for J tickets for two for the 2023 trip, and so I did a bit of a gulp when I saw that QF wanted around $6,000 for the same flights a year later for the planned 2024 trip. But we decided to just suck it up as we really wanted to go. I had a look, found the flights we wanted (CBR-SYD-HND return) and immediately sent off invitations to Seat Daughter and family and Seat Son to participate at parental expense. They were warned that I was booking in the DSC window and needed a quick reply.

First mistake. These pampered Gen Y's could not decide if it would suit them to take an all expenses paid holiday with us and stuffed around for 2 days, until I lost patience and sent an ultimatum requiring a decision by the next morning. They both got back with "no thanks".

So I went to book for Mr Seat 0A and me and learnt a good travel lesson - I will now also post this in the "travel mistakes" thread. When QF have that little banner saying "price nearly gone" they actually mean it. The flights that were about $6,000 were now nearly $8,000 and I decided it wasn't worth that to me. Boy, was I upset with the stuffing around. And angry with myself for not getting onto it to suit myself. It will be a long time before I offer those kids another free trip! So I steeled myself to no trip to the snow in 2024. If I analyse my feelings, I also really felt sad to miss the trip, which showed me how much I actually wanted to go and ski Japan agan.

For some reason, I then decided to see whether there were any better deals through other less convenient departure gateways. And lo and behold, I found seats, out of BNE, to HND and back home via MEL for just under $7,000 each (see how QF boils you like a frog into thinking that's value ). So I booked. A bit disappointed to have to spend $2,000 more than I expected ($1,000 per ticket) and also to miss the F Lounge experience, but at least I could go on my trip, that apparently I really really wanted to do.

View attachment 372845

And that's where the trouble started....

Gen Y nowadays: Taking business class nowadays is sooooooo overrated.
Boomer:...