School trip from Tokyo

The School trip finished up today with some fun in the terrain park in the afternoon, no one was injured all the kids seemed to have a great time skiing in Kandatsu and the ski instructor staff also including our Japanese instructor had a fun time teaching them. This has been our first school trip for the year and we have more to follow but if they all continue like this it should be great ! The weather forecast is looking to be snow from tonight (around 9:00pm) and should hold out for the rest of the weekend and pickup again on Tuesday. See you on the Mountain.

Full day at Kandatsu

Today I taught kids from the British School in Tokyo for the whole day, these guys are up until wednesday and are at Kandatsu for the whole time during the day, there are great group of kids who are all at different levels of ski/boarding but they are all trying there best, the conditions at Kandatsu where great today with the sun shining, tomorrow looks to be more snow until atleast Saturday if not further - we`ll have to wait and see but there is well over 1m in the town so thats great news.

Snow is still falling

My Predicted snowfall of 20-30cm was a little short of what fell, Kagura reported 60cm at the top with the village getting a good 40cm of snow, it is still dumping down and there should be atleast another 10-20cm by tonight. Last night I took a "short" journey to Muikamachi (the next town over) and the short drive ended up being very long and hard going and at one point when stopping at a traffic light the snow on the roof of the car covered the whole windscreen. Anyone coming up this weekend is set for some really good snow but please be careful if you`re driving or even walking down the road. Have a good weekend.

A Winters day

Strong winds, poor visibility and snowfall which is almost horizontal is what it is set to be all day. Kagura and Gala are both closed to due to the strong winds. The snow is set to remain till at least Saturday but depending on the weather could change to snow again after Saturday. This system is set to put another 20-30cm on the Yuzawa reorts and a little bit more at Kagura. I hope everyone can get out on the hill this weekend !

Yuzawa Park Resort

One of the joys of this area is the amount of resorts within easy reach of the town. Most people don't venture away from a couple of the more popular areas but you can jump on a bus and 10 minutes later find yourself at the foot of a resort with a completely new area to explore. Today I had an afternoon lesson at Yuzawa Park Resort. There was hardly anyone there, the slopes were in pristine condition due to the cold temperatures and there was still un-skied courdroy at 4pm. It's well worth venturing off the beaten track.

Great weekend

The continuous snowfall over the past week has amounted to a very good weekend across all the resorts. Everyone I talked to this weekend seemed to have a great time, arguably the best weekend of the season so far! Today and tomorrow look to be cloudy with a little snow but the snow will pick up again on Wednesday with another cold front coming through. It looks to be another good weekend next weekend as well.

Perfect weekend ahead

This weekend is set to be the best yet for snow conditions in Yuzawa, its absolutely dumping at the moment and only briefly stopped about 2am this morning, first lifts tomorrow morning sounds like a really good idea! Some member of the welovesnow team are heading to Tashiro tomorrow while others are at some of the smaller resorts like Naspa and Gala. I hope everyone has an enjoyable weekend and remember to dress warmly.

WeLoveSnow on TV !

This afternoon Niigata Supernews came and talked to us about the guiness record, they took footage of Josh, Partick and Koji at Gala Ski Resort in preparation and re-breaking the records this year. We discussed it in small and have included alot of night skiing and expanding across to Maiko Ski Resort, Ishiuchi Maruyama and Joetsu Kouksai. We will have to wait and see, the footage will be aired on the 22nd of Janurary from about 6:30pm.

Snowing heavily

Today is the day to be out on the hill, snow has been falling heavily since about 6:00am this morning and it looks like its set to continue for the rest of the day the 1 week weather outlook is either snow or cloud and very low tempertaures. It probably won`t get much warmer than -3 today. Today would be a perfect day out in either in Kagura or Hakkaisan and this weekend is set to be very good so if you can`t make it during the week make sure to be up for the weekend.

Nozawa Onsen Fire Festival

Yesterday night was the Nozawa Onsen fire festival. Nozawa Onsen is about a 1 hour drive from Yuzawa and is a small Onsen town located in the mountains. The fire festival involved people trying to light a structure with flaming torches while other people tried to put the flames out so the structure would not alight, eventually it was set alight and a spectacular display was put on. All in all it was great night.

Day out in Hakkaisan

This week has not seen it stop snowing and on Sunday we gave Kagura a miss and tried out Hakkaisan in Mukikamachi. What a good move! There was hardly anyone around and with their policy similar to that of Kagura in terms of off-piste lots of fun can be had, we almost ended up in a river a couple of times! It is defintley worth the 30 minute drive from Yuzawa for such a great resort!

Beatiful Snow

Overnight snowfall was around 15cm in town, much more up in Kagura where it started snowing in the late afternoon. It has no cleared up to a fine partly cloudy day. The weekend outlook is for it to snow all through the weekend. This is good news because Monday is a public holiday and Kagura should be really good.