Our taxi skids alongside banks of 10-foot-high blue-white snow, bringing us safely (just) to the door of luxury ryokan Zaborin. As the flakes from the top sprinkle down on us like a robust dusting of sugar, I fear I’ve overestimated my appetite for adventure.
I didn’t grow up skiing, but over the past 10 years I’ve dutifully endured the humiliation of learning snow sports as an adult in the Alps. My dedication is positioned as embracing my ski-instructor husband’s interests, but in reality it’s tied to my thinly veiled penchant for raclette. So why, when Europe’s Alps make for a perfectly fine ski break and there’s so much of Japan to explore, are we here in popular resort town Niseko staring down the barrel of a very cold gun?
Resisting every urge to return my skis and spend the next five days at our hotel’s onsen, I relinquish myself to the guardianship of my husband to shimmy me down the slopes safely. Thankfully on terra flatter, the positives begin to mount quickly. There’s rice and pickles for breakfasts — a strong start — and only one mountain to navigate (although if the notion takes you, you can access other ski areas in an interlinked series of peaks). In contrast to the Alps’ sprawling, multi-resort regions, this is much more manageable to navigate: a real gift for a long-term beginner like me.
At the top of the mountain we take a photo in front of a giant thermometer. It’s -10 degrees celsius, and peeling back my ninja neoprene face-cover exposes my pink cheeks to a flurry of fat snowflakes. The cold in Japan feels different from the biting wind chill of the Alps though — there’s a softness to the air here, even when temperatures drop far below freezing. And, unlike the Alps where snow is often groomed and packed down, here the legendary powder is light, fluffy and absurdly deep, creating a completely different kind of skiing environment to the often hard, icy runs of Europe. The constant snowfall creates thick drifts that graciously catch me every time I fall and help propel me down the piste at a pleasant pace, so that I sort of, maybe, feel in charge of where my body is going.
Inevitably I grow tired of the exercise part of the holiday and we head to a mountainside restaurant called Bo-yo-so, which is one of the few independent eateries on the piste and has been run by the same husband and wife team since it opened in 1986. It’s an excellent sign that the windows are clouded with condensation from the steaming bowls of ramen. Hot soup and chewy noodles are about as far from Savoyard fare as you can get, yet somehow equally as comforting.
Buoyed by the warmth returning to our fingers, we reinstate our many layers and head back out. There’s something about the clarity of the air in Niseko that makes everything feel more vibrant, more crisp. Unlike the sprawling mountain ranges back in Europe, from the top there’s no view at all, but as the clouds continue to roll in and dump fistfuls of snow as they pass,the persistent flurries coat little woodland clusters, creating Christmas-card-worthy scenes that we float through. We toss the snow from the side of our skis, absorbed by that unique euphoric feeling of zipping along off-piste patches that I’d never dream of attempting in France or Switzerland.
Safe passage to the bottom of the slope is rewarded with a little hot chocolate from a kiosk at the end of the run, cupped in a mittened hand. Warmed, we begin the trudge back to the hotel, down streets heated to negate the chance of slipping on ice — the Japanese truly think of everything. Once safely back home, instead of tackling a lively après we head to our gender-separated onsens, glad that we have no tattoos between us (they’re banned in many onsens because of their historic links with gang culture), and with only a touch of trepidation about being from the UK and having to be naked in front of others.
After surviving the communal bath, we fall into bed to recuperate for tomorrow, which brings with it a round of night skiing to contend with. Floodlit runs allow the sport to stretch past six o’clock, when usually I’d be safely tucked up in a bar somewhere with a vin chaud. It feels like you’ve somehow snuck out of bounds, and once you’re there you don’t want to leave until the pistes fall dark again.
Each night we work our way round Niseko, exploring the small ramble of snow-blanketed streets with their low wooden buildings. While the ex-pat crowd has given it an international feel, the food is — for the most part — staunchly Japanese. The Hokkaido prefecture, where Niseko is set, is famous for its sushi, something that feels so at odds with the usual comfort-food fare of skiing resorts. We greedily get on board over the next few days and stuff ourselves with some of the finest rolls and nigiri we’ve ever had. On another evening, we try hotpot at Shabu Shabu Mori, where we cook Wagyu beef slivers and abundant vegetables in fragrant stock at our table.
Most meals are simultaneously masterful and frill-free, but on a couple of evenings we treat ourselves to something a little fancier. The Barn by Odin is a vast glass-fronted outbuilding that’s inspired by traditional Hokkaido farm architecture. It’s beautiful and filled with the town’s great and good, who come to try the upmarket European-bistro-style menu that is completely unique in this part of the world.
At Zaborin, there’s a multi-course kaiseki dinner included in the overnight rate. While we savoured sushi and ramen at local haunts, Zaborin’s kaiseki was a masterclass in seasonally led Japanese haute cuisine — a sophisticated respite from the rugged adventure of the mountains.
I was more than a little sceptical about venturing out into the unknown and embracing skiing on far-flung shores. But what I found was the thrill of extreme conditions thawed by steaming bowls of ramen and platters of crisp sushi, as well as magical forest routes, floodlit night pistes and endless, thick drifts that gave a childlike buoyancy to every wrong move. Japan’s skiing culture offers an experience that’s both familiar and refreshingly different from the Alps — more serene, more connected to nature, and perhaps even more memorable. If you can, go.
Not ready to cheat on the Alps? See our collection of piste-approximate European ski hotels