What an amazing Golden Week 2025! After the record snowfall this past winter, probably over 14m in total, I just had to go to Nagano to ski. So, I went 2回 in one week!
On April 29th, I picked up the Suzuki Every Kei-van rental at 8pm, and drove about 3-hours, then parked in a service area on the highway and slept about 5-hours. Then woke up at dawn, maybe 5:00am, and drove another 3-hours to Hakuba.
I had an inflatable mattress in the van, so I slept like a baby!
After taking the gondola up to the mid-station, the Happo-One ski area still had 3m of snow!! They could EASILY stay open until June!!
I trained my legs everyday before this trip, so the legs were in pretty good shape!
Sleeping in the van again that night was fun, and the next day, May 1st, I skied at Hakuba Goryu. It was another perfect blue-sky day, and the moguls were big and soft!
I drove home after skiing, and made it back to Osaka by 11pm!
We then rented a camping car on Saturday, May 3rd, and left Osaka again at 8pm. Same driving schedule: drive about 3-hours, sleep, then drive another 3-hours to Hakuba in the morning!
We tried to ski at Happo-One, but strong winds had closed the lifts, so we skied at Goryu under morning sunny skies.
After skiing we drove 1.5 hours to Nozawa Onsen and skied the next day there. Nozawa onsens are VERY VERY HOT!
And I got to crack open macadamia nuts from Australia⬇:
It was an incredible trip!
