Tateyama Kurobe Alpine Route, Japan (2015)

Weekend trip with our awesome friend Monica! We all wanted to do this for a while, and it didn’t disappoint! I think most people don’t realize how much snow dumps on Japan every year (the three snowiest cities on earth are all in Japan). These type of snow tunnels and paths are quite frequent across the northern half of the country. This particular famous spot doesn’t even open until April because its too difficult/expensive to plow all the snow continually. Go google “snowiest cities on earth”!

Anyhow, it was a bit of a nuisance to get to this area, but worth the trip. The demographics of the visitors was a surprise. Judging by languages spoken, I would say the breakdown was roughly:

90% Chinese
6% Other parts of Asia
3% North America/Europe
1% Japanese

And to be honest, I’m being generous with the 1% Japanese. I barely heard any Japanese the entire weekend. The gift shops greeted us with “ni hao”, not “ira sshai mase”. The photographers stationed at picturesque spots only spoke Chinese. I really thought there would be a varied mix with more westerners and locals. I always thought Niseko was the least Japanese place in Japan, but this topped it. USDJPY is so wrongly high.

Anyhow the pics! Went for a cinematic look on this set, all 16:9 and tried to grade accordingly.