By Cain Nunns, CNN
Niseko, Japan (CNN) — I am somewhere in the trees. Thigh-deep in powder. Stomping through the snow. Not riding my board as I should be but carrying it.
Muttering to myself about taking the wrong line and getting stuck, I breathe heavily as I start the deep, long march back. It is a problem most skiers and snowboarders would pay to have.
And they do in their droves.
About 20 feet below me, Chris Laurent, from Paris, has a different problem.
“I can’t find my ski,” he says, swearing and laughing at the same time as he digs into a growing mound of fresh powder.
“I know it is in here somewhere. But where?”
Snowflakes the size of silver dollar coins continue to rain down on both of us.
These are Niseko problems. The powder capital of Asia, and some say the world.
Japan, long revered as a powder Mecca, has faced a chilling reality in recent years: warming winters, diminished snowfall, plummeting numbers of local skiers and snowboarders and the shuttering of once-booming resorts.
However, this season, industry insiders were salivating as the La Niña weather pattern — a cyclical period of cooler weather — pointed to a return to the massive snow dumps that made the island of Hokkaido, where Niseko is located, legendary. The last La Niña-driven season in Japan was 2021–2022, topping record snowfall numbers at many resorts.
Early on, the results were impressive: Niseko started the season by breaking a 68-year-old record for snowfall in the first month of December.
Since then, there was a lull when the powder machine was turned off before cranking up again in late February as some of the globe’s most frigid cold fronts from Siberia moved east across the Sea of Japan and into Japan’s most northern island.
“It really snows a lot. It’s the best quality snow in Japan. In the beginning of the year, I go up every day,” says Jia-Rong Chen, who left a job in tech in Tokyo to come to Niseko for the season.
“But by the middle of the season, I’m a little spoiled. I’ve had enough powder already. Some people think it is a great season if they come in January and there is snow. Some think it’s the worst if they come in February and there isn’t. But it always evens out.”
Japan’s rapidly aging demographic, sputtering economy and fewer skiers have closed hundreds of resorts in the past decade. Some studies say that local skier and snowboarder numbers have plummeted by as much as 75% since the dizzying days of the bubble economy in the 1990s.
For now, though, Niseko seems to be bulletproof.
The town has been riding a wave of increasing foreign visitors and the opening of new fancy resorts and eateries over the past several years. Hotels such as Setsu Niseko, winner of the World’s Best New Ski Hotel at the 2023 World Ski Awards and new entry Muwa Niseko which won last year’s competition have opened their doors. A fleet of Michelin-starred Japanese chefs are also betting the party will continue.
A lot of the new investments can be attributed to the consistency of the snow coverage and the belief of the Japanese that Mount Yotei (a mini–Mount Fuji usually shrouded in clouds that looms over the area) is a ‘snow catcher.’
Climatologists say the scientific markers looked great before the season. And that La Niña had an impact on snow coverage early on. But what sets the town apart from its competitors is the quality of the airy, light powder that falls in unrelenting curtains when the cold fronts roll in.
“December temperatures were below normal. After that, January was abnormally hot. La Niña is decaying rapidly. It shortened. In the early part of the season, that snowfall was from La Niña, then it petered out,” says Professor Tomonori Sato, a meteorological researcher from Hokkaido University.
“I was born in Niigata Prefecture and know snow quality very well. My hometown is close to Nozawa Onsen (a ski resort on Japan’s Honshu island) that has been battered by snow this year). The snow is very, very wet and heavy there. I can ski much better in Hokkaido.”
Hokkaido is surrounded by water, which fuels the weather systems that produce the consistent dry powder it is world-renowned for. And while there are concerns about climate change affecting the quantity and quality of snow, most insiders believe that visitors will keep coming.
“Global warming is not an issue just for us, it’s an issue for the entire globe. If we’re going to get wetter snow, California will probably get no snow,” says Satoshi Nagai, general manager of Niseko Tourism Promotion, in his cramped but busy office a few minutes’ walk from the ski chair at upmarket Hirafu.
“We used to be called an Aussie town. Pre-Covid about about 50% of all guests were from Australia. That’s decreased to a little more than 20%, but the total number of Aussies has not changed much, which means that we were getting more people from other parts of the world.”
A quick walk up to that lift in Hirafu shows what Nagai is talking about. Preening influencers are everywhere. Some snap selfies in snowsuits worth thousands of dollars. Others sip champagne in a yurt designed by Louis Vuitton, others chow down on dumplings from a one Michelin-star food truck, or $170 ribeyes by US-based Wolfgang Steakhouse. Heli-ski operators ferry well-heeled customers to surrounding mountains and luxury concierge companies offer everything from chef’s tables to bespoke snowmobile tours.
There was a time when Niseko United — a collection of four resorts, Annapurna, Niseko Village, Hirafu, often divided into upper and lower and Hanazono — was called the Vale of the East, or the St Moritz of Japan. It was compared to the famous Alpine bolt holes of the West.
But no more. Niseko is a destination in its own right.
“I’ve been in Niseko for 10 years, and I don’t think that we’ve ever had a bad snow year in that time,” says Patrick Ohtani, COO of Luxe Nomad, which manages high-end properties in Hokkaido, Thailand and Indonesia.
“We’re super lucky because we have all the winds off Siberia picking up the moisture. The high pressure hits that weather system, and then the snow just starts falling. Compared to other ski destinations in the world the altitude plays a big factor.”
Ohtani says that an increasing number of American skiers are coming from all over the country, including the East Coast. Happy to fly halfway around the world when their own season at home is still underway.
Many of them come with the IKON pass, which offers seven days of unfettered access to Niseko United.
“The biggest story for us is the US market really establishing a dominant footing. Back in 2017, it accounted for only 619 guest nights,” says Ohtani.
“This year to date, we have booked 4,823 nights, an increase of 404%. Revenue from last year for US travelers has increased by 130%.”
The-CNN-Wire
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