- Joined
- Sep 20, 2018
- Posts
- 3,365
- Qantas
- Platinum
Flushed with the kind response to my belated Middle East and Central Europe TR, I've decided to have another go with a belated report of our trip to Japan from January - February 2023.
Japanuary 2023 - another belated trip report
- Thread starter Seat0B
- Start date
- Joined
- Sep 20, 2018
- Posts
- 3,365
- Qantas
- Platinum
Background to the Trip
This trip was quite a while in the making. We have become quite converted to taking a ski holiday in Japan, often with the Seat children (plus partners) and sometimes with other Seat relatives (Mr Seat 0A's twin sisters and their hubbies) and have made this trip in 2015, skip 2016 to recover from a knee replacement, 2017, 2018, skip 2019 to ski in America (as requested by Seat Son, and NOT a good idea as it was expensive, hard to get to and I suffered from High Altitude Pulmonary Oedema in Breckenridge and was admitted to hospital and largely unable to ski - a tale for a trip report that I have never actually written
) and then again 2020 right as COVID got real. In fact we were due to return from that trip via Shanghai in late Feb-early Mar 2020, and it took a lot of effort to re-route the return flights, but that is a tale for yet another trip report that I did not write . o I was really disappointed to have to skip Japanuary 2021 due to COVID.
I Book a Luxury Escape
In about May 2021, I got really excited by a deal offered by Luxury Escapes for a beautiful furnished apartment, ski in/ski out in Niseko, where we have not skied since 2010. It was bookable for ski season 2021/2022 or 2022/2023. It was clearly labelled as "100% refund guarantee" and "free cancellation", so I thought I would take a punt on being able to ski in Japan by January 2023. I checked with the Seat kids, and they said, yep, we are in, so I booked it for Mr Seat 0A and me, Seat Daughter, wife and baby, and Seat Son plus a friend (he had split up with his long term GF in mid 2021, and we were not sure who he might want to bring). It was more about giving me some hope that one day COVID would be over and I would see Seat Son again than actually wanting to ski in Niseko per se.
I Book Flights
In March 2022, I booked paid J flights for Mr Seat 0A and myself to Tokyo for 24 January 2023-21 February 2023 during the DSC offer. This was a bit speculative as Japan was still not open to foreigners at that time, but I was not too worried and figured I would just change to some other destination if need be.
Seat Kids Begin to Flip Flop
Next I turned my attention to securing flights for the Seat kids. Well it seems like free flights and a free holiday are certainly gift horses that the Seat kids were more than willing to look in the mouth! After some procrastinating, Seat daugher and wife decided it was probably all too hard to travel with a little one who would be 2 by the time the trip was taken, and said they probably wouldn't come, but they would make their mind up closer to time. Seat Son was unable to make a decision - didn't know if he could get the time off work that far out, and didn't want to come if his sister wasn't coming too. Plus they both criticised me heavily for booking a holiday in March 2022 that wouldn't be taken until January 2023, caliming that absolutely no one planned that far in advance. Well I do, so that I can get a good deal, DSC airfares and maybe even CR flights for some or all of them, but I shrugged my shoulders and said, oh well, Japan isn't open yet, we can make a final decision when it opens. OK they said, unenthusiastically. I settled down to wait and see what happened. I am not good with waiting or uncertainty, so this was quite hard for me.
Japan Remains Closed and Kids Bug Out
Japan was very very late to open up. Finally on 12 Septmber 2022 the Japanese government announced that from 11 October, independent tourists would be free to visit Japan.
By now, Seat Daughter and her family had forgotten all about Japan and had instead accepted an invititation from her cousin to visit in Lake Tahoe for Christmas. So they confirmed they would not come. And Seat Son said it was now too short notice to get time off work as he was in the middle of a big trial and that he also wouln't come. So now I needed to cancel my fully refundable Luxury Escape.
When Fully Refundable is Not Fully Refundable
When I went to cancel, I discovered that they had changed the terms and conditions on the booking - sometime after I made what I thought was 100% refund guaranteed booking. They changed it to "flexible cancellation" which means you can only get a LE credit, which was not at all what I wanted with a booking worth over $8,500 that was sold as fully refundable. The sales agent refused to budge. Luckily I had taken all these screen shots (a legacy of years of dealing with QF) and quoted Australian Consumer Law at them very confidently until she agreed to escalate it to a manager - who just caved in and gave me the refund I was entitled to. I found this very stressful and it totally cheesed me off. I was already cheesed off that my longed for family holiday was not going to happen, and then this was just the last straw. I was ready to cancel the whole trip and just not go.
Spoiler Alert: I did not cancel the whole trip. We did go, and we had a fabulous time.
More to follow.
This trip was quite a while in the making. We have become quite converted to taking a ski holiday in Japan, often with the Seat children (plus partners) and sometimes with other Seat relatives (Mr Seat 0A's twin sisters and their hubbies) and have made this trip in 2015, skip 2016 to recover from a knee replacement, 2017, 2018, skip 2019 to ski in America (as requested by Seat Son, and NOT a good idea as it was expensive, hard to get to and I suffered from High Altitude Pulmonary Oedema in Breckenridge and was admitted to hospital and largely unable to ski - a tale for a trip report that I have never actually written
) and then again 2020 right as COVID got real. In fact we were due to return from that trip via Shanghai in late Feb-early Mar 2020, and it took a lot of effort to re-route the return flights, but that is a tale for yet another trip report that I did not write . o I was really disappointed to have to skip Japanuary 2021 due to COVID.I Book a Luxury Escape
In about May 2021, I got really excited by a deal offered by Luxury Escapes for a beautiful furnished apartment, ski in/ski out in Niseko, where we have not skied since 2010. It was bookable for ski season 2021/2022 or 2022/2023. It was clearly labelled as "100% refund guarantee" and "free cancellation", so I thought I would take a punt on being able to ski in Japan by January 2023. I checked with the Seat kids, and they said, yep, we are in, so I booked it for Mr Seat 0A and me, Seat Daughter, wife and baby, and Seat Son plus a friend (he had split up with his long term GF in mid 2021, and we were not sure who he might want to bring). It was more about giving me some hope that one day COVID would be over and I would see Seat Son again than actually wanting to ski in Niseko per se.
I Book Flights
In March 2022, I booked paid J flights for Mr Seat 0A and myself to Tokyo for 24 January 2023-21 February 2023 during the DSC offer. This was a bit speculative as Japan was still not open to foreigners at that time, but I was not too worried and figured I would just change to some other destination if need be.
Seat Kids Begin to Flip Flop
Next I turned my attention to securing flights for the Seat kids. Well it seems like free flights and a free holiday are certainly gift horses that the Seat kids were more than willing to look in the mouth! After some procrastinating, Seat daugher and wife decided it was probably all too hard to travel with a little one who would be 2 by the time the trip was taken, and said they probably wouldn't come, but they would make their mind up closer to time. Seat Son was unable to make a decision - didn't know if he could get the time off work that far out, and didn't want to come if his sister wasn't coming too. Plus they both criticised me heavily for booking a holiday in March 2022 that wouldn't be taken until January 2023, caliming that absolutely no one planned that far in advance. Well I do, so that I can get a good deal, DSC airfares and maybe even CR flights for some or all of them, but I shrugged my shoulders and said, oh well, Japan isn't open yet, we can make a final decision when it opens. OK they said, unenthusiastically. I settled down to wait and see what happened. I am not good with waiting or uncertainty, so this was quite hard for me.
Japan Remains Closed and Kids Bug Out
Japan was very very late to open up. Finally on 12 Septmber 2022 the Japanese government announced that from 11 October, independent tourists would be free to visit Japan.
By now, Seat Daughter and her family had forgotten all about Japan and had instead accepted an invititation from her cousin to visit in Lake Tahoe for Christmas. So they confirmed they would not come. And Seat Son said it was now too short notice to get time off work as he was in the middle of a big trial and that he also wouln't come. So now I needed to cancel my fully refundable Luxury Escape.
When Fully Refundable is Not Fully Refundable
When I went to cancel, I discovered that they had changed the terms and conditions on the booking - sometime after I made what I thought was 100% refund guaranteed booking. They changed it to "flexible cancellation" which means you can only get a LE credit, which was not at all what I wanted with a booking worth over $8,500 that was sold as fully refundable. The sales agent refused to budge. Luckily I had taken all these screen shots (a legacy of years of dealing with QF) and quoted Australian Consumer Law at them very confidently until she agreed to escalate it to a manager - who just caved in and gave me the refund I was entitled to. I found this very stressful and it totally cheesed me off. I was already cheesed off that my longed for family holiday was not going to happen, and then this was just the last straw. I was ready to cancel the whole trip and just not go.
Spoiler Alert: I did not cancel the whole trip. We did go, and we had a fabulous time.
More to follow.
Attachments
- Joined
- Sep 20, 2018
- Posts
- 3,365
- Qantas
- Platinum
More background
So the next few months between September and November passed in a blur of planning and booking. Those of you who read my other recent belated TR will appreciate that I was also planning and booking for a 6 week extravaganza around the Middle East and Central Europe at the same time. Things were a bit hectic.
However, after my disappointment that the Seat kids were not coming along, we decided to do something that we have never done before, and invite a friend to travel with us. My friend is a keen skier, and was retiring as a teacher at the end of 2022 and wanted to do something to celebrate. But as she is a solo traveller, she did not want to go to Japan alone. We've skied together many times in Aus, so decided to give it a go and see how we might travel together. She booked seats on the same flight as us, but was not able to get a sensible connecting flight. We were flying CBR-SYD-HND, and Seat Friend could only book CBR-MEL-SYD-HND arriving a bit later than our connecting flight, so we just planned to meet up in SYD at the international terminal before QF 25 departure. Saved me a bit of drama with the Qf F Lounge as I only had entry for myself as a WP and 1 guest, and that had to be Mr Seat 0A! What could go wrong with this plan??
I managed to cobble together a pretty good itinerary for us. A couple of weeks skiing at Shiga Kogen (been before) and Madarao (new to us) followed by some touring to Matsumoto, Kanazawa, Kyoto and Tokyo before returning home. We bpught a 7 day JR pass, and lashed out for Green Class just to make the luggage situation a bit easier as we were spooked by the tales of luggage limitations on some popular routes (mainly Kyoto-Tokyo). We've only ever used the standard class before, and I have to say the Green Class was very nice, and not much more cost on the shorter pass (about $90), which we were happy to pay as a bit of a splurge. That has all changed though with the massive price rise to the JR pass from later on in 2023.
Also I signed up to FluentU, a language learning app, to refresh my very rusty Japanese in the three months between joining and leaving for Japan. I learned Japanese for 2 years at uni in the early 1980s but did not use it at all until our first trip to Japan in 2010. At that time I was working full time in my own business, had two young adult kids and a busy life, so I did not make any effort. I started trying to refresh myself for 2017 trip by which time it had become obvious that we loved Japan and were definitely going to go many more times. But I found it quite challenging to refresh by myself and did not really make much progress. FluentU really suits me because it uses YouTube videos in Japanese to teach you. They subtitle each video with Japanese text (in full Hiragana, katakana and kanji) and also with just hiragana/katakana so you can read it if you don't know the kanji, and finally with English translation. Then after you watch the videos, you do multiple drills that help you learn the vocabulary, the kanji and the expressions. You can choose from a massive selection of videos about all kinds of topics - sport, the arts, Japanese culture, travel, pop culture, children's show, TV advertisements etc. I don't know how it would be if you didn't already know some grammar (as I did) because it's pretty much rote learning, which I usually dislike when trying to learn a language as I prefer to understand the grammar and sentence structures so I can create my own sentences rather than just learning a set phrase. Anyway, it's working for me and I even did my daily pledge of 10 mins study through out the Middle East and Europe, which certainly got me a few funny looks along the way
. I'm really enjoying using FluentU - I have continued to practice every day in the hope that #Japanuary 2024 goes ahead despite the surprise leukaemia diagnosis that looks like cancelling everything.
So the next few months between September and November passed in a blur of planning and booking. Those of you who read my other recent belated TR will appreciate that I was also planning and booking for a 6 week extravaganza around the Middle East and Central Europe at the same time. Things were a bit hectic.
However, after my disappointment that the Seat kids were not coming along, we decided to do something that we have never done before, and invite a friend to travel with us. My friend is a keen skier, and was retiring as a teacher at the end of 2022 and wanted to do something to celebrate. But as she is a solo traveller, she did not want to go to Japan alone. We've skied together many times in Aus, so decided to give it a go and see how we might travel together. She booked seats on the same flight as us, but was not able to get a sensible connecting flight. We were flying CBR-SYD-HND, and Seat Friend could only book CBR-MEL-SYD-HND arriving a bit later than our connecting flight, so we just planned to meet up in SYD at the international terminal before QF 25 departure. Saved me a bit of drama with the Qf F Lounge as I only had entry for myself as a WP and 1 guest, and that had to be Mr Seat 0A! What could go wrong with this plan??
I managed to cobble together a pretty good itinerary for us. A couple of weeks skiing at Shiga Kogen (been before) and Madarao (new to us) followed by some touring to Matsumoto, Kanazawa, Kyoto and Tokyo before returning home. We bpught a 7 day JR pass, and lashed out for Green Class just to make the luggage situation a bit easier as we were spooked by the tales of luggage limitations on some popular routes (mainly Kyoto-Tokyo). We've only ever used the standard class before, and I have to say the Green Class was very nice, and not much more cost on the shorter pass (about $90), which we were happy to pay as a bit of a splurge. That has all changed though with the massive price rise to the JR pass from later on in 2023.
Also I signed up to FluentU, a language learning app, to refresh my very rusty Japanese in the three months between joining and leaving for Japan. I learned Japanese for 2 years at uni in the early 1980s but did not use it at all until our first trip to Japan in 2010. At that time I was working full time in my own business, had two young adult kids and a busy life, so I did not make any effort. I started trying to refresh myself for 2017 trip by which time it had become obvious that we loved Japan and were definitely going to go many more times. But I found it quite challenging to refresh by myself and did not really make much progress. FluentU really suits me because it uses YouTube videos in Japanese to teach you. They subtitle each video with Japanese text (in full Hiragana, katakana and kanji) and also with just hiragana/katakana so you can read it if you don't know the kanji, and finally with English translation. Then after you watch the videos, you do multiple drills that help you learn the vocabulary, the kanji and the expressions. You can choose from a massive selection of videos about all kinds of topics - sport, the arts, Japanese culture, travel, pop culture, children's show, TV advertisements etc. I don't know how it would be if you didn't already know some grammar (as I did) because it's pretty much rote learning, which I usually dislike when trying to learn a language as I prefer to understand the grammar and sentence structures so I can create my own sentences rather than just learning a set phrase. Anyway, it's working for me and I even did my daily pledge of 10 mins study through out the Middle East and Europe, which certainly got me a few funny looks along the way
. I'm really enjoying using FluentU - I have continued to practice every day in the hope that #Japanuary 2024 goes ahead despite the surprise leukaemia diagnosis that looks like cancelling everything.
- Joined
- Jan 26, 2011
- Posts
- 28,458
- Qantas
- Platinum
- Virgin
- Red
Getting adult kids organised to go on family holidays is like herding cats.
- Joined
- Sep 20, 2018
- Posts
- 3,365
- Qantas
- Platinum
Tuesday 24 January 2023 - Canberra to Tokyo - Part 1 - CBR-SYD
This was not a smooth day at all, dear reader.
It all started when our real estate agent in Melbourne called up at 1130 to say that he had a firm offer on 30 day settlement to buy a student accommodation unit that we had been trying to sell for 6 months or more. That was very good news - but not on the day of departure for a 28 day overseas holiday! We found ourselves thrown into a morass of legal admin in preparation for the sale, all of which would have been difficult to impossible if it happened tomorrow when we are in Japan:
Except that at 1500, taxi driver called and said he was running 5 minutes late. He then proceeded to be 45 minutes late, arriving at our place at 1600 and picking up peak hour traffic so we did not arrive to airport until close to 1700. By then the Qantas app was getting quite agitated with me "check in is closing soon. Please check in for your flight." Easier said than done in the back of a taxi with the level of detail to be entered on an iPhone. Stress level rising. Anyway, arrived at airport with about 15 minutes to spare, so checked in at the counter.
Next curve ball was QF check in requiring to see the QR code approval from the Visit Japan Web live on the actual web site. This was very frustrating as the VJW site repeatedly advised us to take screen shots of the QR codes and use those on arrival in Japan as it avoided the need for internet access. So that's what we had done, and QF was not having a bar of it. I was able to log in and show my code "live", but Mr Seat 0A had logged out and brain dumped his password etc and could not log back in again. He started the torturous process of trying to reset everything on his phone while the time ticked down. After 10 fruitless minutes, the check in girl relented and let him through. By now I was lathered in sweat and feeling very stressed.
Unusually, there were no issues for us at security. I may be in the minority, but the new style scanners work much better for me (both knees replaced) than the older ones. Made it to the lounge with, we thought, enough time for one quick drink and then time to board
.
Flight to SYD delayed. That's a bit stressful as we only had 2.5 hrs after arrival in SYD to transit to international terminal, do a tax refund, and enjoy the F Lounge. Have another drink. More delay. Have another drink. Called to board. More delay, some issue with paperwork. Fly to SYD, with several scenic orbits over the Blue Mountains - more delay. Arrive at gate 2, walk to gate 15 for international transfer, wait 20 minutes for the transfer bus, long lines at immigration and security, no fast track, stress levels rising....Finally arrive at F Lounge at 2005, having left Mr Seat 0A in the tax refund line, with QF 25 boarding at 2050. Not happy Jan. I just managed to squeeze in a much needed shower and slam down a dinner of salt and pepper squid and pavlova before boarding was called punctually at 2050. Mr Seat 0A joined me for some food about half way through my meal having sorted all his tax refund.
OK, time to relax now....
This was not a smooth day at all, dear reader.
It all started when our real estate agent in Melbourne called up at 1130 to say that he had a firm offer on 30 day settlement to buy a student accommodation unit that we had been trying to sell for 6 months or more. That was very good news - but not on the day of departure for a 28 day overseas holiday! We found ourselves thrown into a morass of legal admin in preparation for the sale, all of which would have been difficult to impossible if it happened tomorrow when we are in Japan:
- appointing a conveyancer
- preparing the owner's statement
- obtaining copies of rates, water rates, utilities bills
- obtaining an owners' corporation certificate
- copy of strata title fees
- 100 point ID check
Except that at 1500, taxi driver called and said he was running 5 minutes late. He then proceeded to be 45 minutes late, arriving at our place at 1600 and picking up peak hour traffic so we did not arrive to airport until close to 1700. By then the Qantas app was getting quite agitated with me "check in is closing soon. Please check in for your flight." Easier said than done in the back of a taxi with the level of detail to be entered on an iPhone. Stress level rising. Anyway, arrived at airport with about 15 minutes to spare, so checked in at the counter.
Next curve ball was QF check in requiring to see the QR code approval from the Visit Japan Web live on the actual web site. This was very frustrating as the VJW site repeatedly advised us to take screen shots of the QR codes and use those on arrival in Japan as it avoided the need for internet access. So that's what we had done, and QF was not having a bar of it. I was able to log in and show my code "live", but Mr Seat 0A had logged out and brain dumped his password etc and could not log back in again. He started the torturous process of trying to reset everything on his phone while the time ticked down. After 10 fruitless minutes, the check in girl relented and let him through. By now I was lathered in sweat and feeling very stressed.
Unusually, there were no issues for us at security. I may be in the minority, but the new style scanners work much better for me (both knees replaced) than the older ones. Made it to the lounge with, we thought, enough time for one quick drink and then time to board
.Flight to SYD delayed. That's a bit stressful as we only had 2.5 hrs after arrival in SYD to transit to international terminal, do a tax refund, and enjoy the F Lounge. Have another drink. More delay. Have another drink. Called to board. More delay, some issue with paperwork. Fly to SYD, with several scenic orbits over the Blue Mountains - more delay. Arrive at gate 2, walk to gate 15 for international transfer, wait 20 minutes for the transfer bus, long lines at immigration and security, no fast track, stress levels rising....Finally arrive at F Lounge at 2005, having left Mr Seat 0A in the tax refund line, with QF 25 boarding at 2050. Not happy Jan. I just managed to squeeze in a much needed shower and slam down a dinner of salt and pepper squid and pavlova before boarding was called punctually at 2050. Mr Seat 0A joined me for some food about half way through my meal having sorted all his tax refund.
OK, time to relax now....
- Joined
- Sep 20, 2018
- Posts
- 3,365
- Qantas
- Platinum
Tuesday 24 January 2023 - Canberra to Tokyo - Part 2 - SYD-HND
About now, some of you will be saying "what about Seat Friend?", and that's a great question to ask. She had been sending us a stream of text messages:
Waiting, waiting, waiting. 2200 came and went. 2230 came and went. We were given snacks and drinks and told it was because of storms with lightning within 5km of the airport so no ground crew could work. 2245 came and went and now I'm feeling stressed about curfew. Finally, at 2255, engines started and push back. Very slow taxi and hold with many aircraft in front of us, and we finally departed at 2320, just under 2 hours delay. Now I am nervous, very nervous about making our 0730 bus connection to Shiga Kogen. We had allowed 2 hrs from scheduled 0530 arrival to the bus, which from previous experience should have been plenty - but now that whole buffer had gone with our delay out of SYD.
I elected no dinner, having eaten in the lounge and disciplined myself not to watch any movies but just to go to sleep. I slept quite well in fits and starts until woken for breakfast shortly before arrival. Breakfast was very disappointing. Fruit and yoghurt fine (fruit very under ripe), but the other choices of crumpet and bacon and egg roll were not available, so I selected the only other choice, muesli. Immediately told "sorry madam the muesli wasn't loaded" but nothing else offered as an alternative. When I asked for something more, shrug
. Was eventually given another plate of under ripe fruit. Service was pretty poor all round on this flight, especially when compared with our Emirates (QF Codeshare) flights in December and January.
Well by now, you have of course guessed it. We landed at 0700 instead of 0530. So there was no way we were making that 0730 bus. Maybe we could make the 0830? Clearance at immigration was very slow, with long lines, heaps of poor processes, the need for QR code checking. The there was the wait for bags and oversized ski bags, all takin up precious time. Finally made it to Nagano Snow Shuttle check in at 0815, hoping for a miracle but.....overnight, we had received an email...
We (and the other 20-30 people off our flight) were not going anywhere!!
Nagano Snow Shuttle were actually excellent in the way they handled this - the CEO (Kevin the Kiwi) took personal phone calls to discuss options which were:
This is the day that keeps on giving!
About now, some of you will be saying "what about Seat Friend?", and that's a great question to ask. She had been sending us a stream of text messages:
- leaving my place
- in the lounge in CBR. Where are you? (we had planned to catch up for a drink before she diverted to MEL, but our late taxi driver scuttled that plan)
- leaving now for MEL
- arrived in MEL
- having a drink in the lounge in MEL
- delayed in MEL
- still delayed in MEL
- OMG still delayed in MEL, I think I'm going to miss QF25.
Waiting, waiting, waiting. 2200 came and went. 2230 came and went. We were given snacks and drinks and told it was because of storms with lightning within 5km of the airport so no ground crew could work. 2245 came and went and now I'm feeling stressed about curfew. Finally, at 2255, engines started and push back. Very slow taxi and hold with many aircraft in front of us, and we finally departed at 2320, just under 2 hours delay. Now I am nervous, very nervous about making our 0730 bus connection to Shiga Kogen. We had allowed 2 hrs from scheduled 0530 arrival to the bus, which from previous experience should have been plenty - but now that whole buffer had gone with our delay out of SYD.
I elected no dinner, having eaten in the lounge and disciplined myself not to watch any movies but just to go to sleep. I slept quite well in fits and starts until woken for breakfast shortly before arrival. Breakfast was very disappointing. Fruit and yoghurt fine (fruit very under ripe), but the other choices of crumpet and bacon and egg roll were not available, so I selected the only other choice, muesli. Immediately told "sorry madam the muesli wasn't loaded" but nothing else offered as an alternative. When I asked for something more, shrug
. Was eventually given another plate of under ripe fruit. Service was pretty poor all round on this flight, especially when compared with our Emirates (QF Codeshare) flights in December and January.Well by now, you have of course guessed it. We landed at 0700 instead of 0530. So there was no way we were making that 0730 bus. Maybe we could make the 0830? Clearance at immigration was very slow, with long lines, heaps of poor processes, the need for QR code checking. The there was the wait for bags and oversized ski bags, all takin up precious time. Finally made it to Nagano Snow Shuttle check in at 0815, hoping for a miracle but.....overnight, we had received an email...
We (and the other 20-30 people off our flight) were not going anywhere!!
Nagano Snow Shuttle were actually excellent in the way they handled this - the CEO (Kevin the Kiwi) took personal phone calls to discuss options which were:
- cancel for a full refund
- get to Shinagawa, catch shinkansen to Nagano, and then the Nagaden bus to Shiga. But... the shinkansen was not guaranteed to run (too much snow on the tracks) and the 90 minute bus trip between Nagano and Shiga Kogen was expected to take 5 hrs, if it was actually able to run
- reschedule for tomorrow, when buses were expected to run as normal.
This is the day that keeps on giving!
- Joined
- Sep 20, 2018
- Posts
- 3,365
- Qantas
- Platinum
Oh I forgot to mention that one of the advantages of our delay out of SYD was that Seat Friend's bags did actually make it across to international and were loaded onto QF25 and safely arrived in Haneda. So that was a big bonus.
- Joined
- Apr 2, 2011
- Posts
- 7,830
- Qantas
- LT Gold
- Virgin
- Gold
Slightly OT but FluentU has a special at the moment - I'm keen to brush up on my French and get maybe a bit of Spanish and German. Do you know if the subscription allows multiple languages or just one (I can't seem to find that on their website)
- Joined
- Sep 20, 2018
- Posts
- 3,365
- Qantas
- Platinum
Flyfrequently
Established Member
- Joined
- Jun 20, 2022
- Posts
- 1,103
- Qantas
- Gold
Loving this so far. I think surfers are like skiers....?!Background to the Trip
This trip was quite a while in the making. We have become quite converted to taking a ski holiday in Japan, often with the Seat children (plus partners) and sometimes with other Seat relatives (Mr Seat 0A's twin sisters and their hubbies) and have made this trip in 2015, skip 2016 to recover from a knee replacement, 2017, 2018, skip 2019 to ski in America (as requested by Seat Son, and NOT a good idea as it was expensive, hard to get to and I suffered from High Altitude Pulmonary Oedema in Breckenridge and was admitted to hospital and largely unable to ski - a tale for a trip report that I have never actually written
I Book a Luxury Escape
In about May 2021, I got really excited by a deal offered by Luxury Escapes for a beautiful furnished apartment, ski in/ski out in Niseko, where we have not skied since 2010. It was bookable for ski season 2021/2022 or 2022/2023. It was clearly labelled as "100% refund guarantee" and "free cancellation", so I thought I would take a punt on being able to ski in Japan by January 2023. I checked with the Seat kids, and they said, yep, we are in, so I booked it for Mr Seat 0A and me, Seat Daughter, wife and baby, and Seat Son plus a friend (he had split up with his long term GF in mid 2021, and we were not sure who he might want to bring). It was more about giving me some hope that one day COVID would be over and I would see Seat Son again than actually wanting to ski in Niseko per se.
View attachment 351100
View attachment 351103
I Book Flights
In March 2022, I booked paid J flights for Mr Seat 0A and myself to Tokyo for 24 January 2023-21 February 2023 during the DSC offer. This was a bit speculative as Japan was still not open to foreigners at that time, but I was not too worried and figured I would just change to some other destination if need be.
Seat Kids Begin to Flip Flop
Next I turned my attention to securing flights for the Seat kids. Well it seems like free flights and a free holiday are certainly gift horses that the Seat kids were more than willing to look in the mouth! After some procrastinating, Seat daugher and wife decided it was probably all too hard to travel with a little one who would be 2 by the time the trip was taken, and said they probably wouldn't come, but they would make their mind up closer to time. Seat Son was unable to make a decision - didn't know if he could get the time off work that far out, and didn't want to come if his sister wasn't coming too. Plus they both criticised me heavily for booking a holiday in March 2022 that wouldn't be taken until January 2023, caliming that absolutely no one planned that far in advance. Well I do, so that I can get a good deal, DSC airfares and maybe even CR flights for some or all of them, but I shrugged my shoulders and said, oh well, Japan isn't open yet, we can make a final decision when it opens. OK they said, unenthusiastically. I settled down to wait and see what happened. I am not good with waiting or uncertainty, so this was quite hard for me.
Japan Remains Closed and Kids Bug Out
Japan was very very late to open up. Finally on 12 Septmber 2022 the Japanese government announced that from 11 October, independent tourists would be free to visit Japan.
By now, Seat Daughter and her family had forgotten all about Japan and had instead accepted an invititation from her cousin to visit in Lake Tahoe for Christmas. So they confirmed they would not come. And Seat Son said it was now too short notice to get time off work as he was in the middle of a big trial and that he also wouln't come. So now I needed to cancel my fully refundable Luxury Escape.
When Fully Refundable is Not Fully Refundable
When I went to cancel, I discovered that they had changed the terms and conditions on the booking - sometime after I made what I thought was 100% refund guaranteed booking. They changed it to "flexible cancellation" which means you can only get a LE credit, which was not at all what I wanted with a booking worth over $8,500 that was sold as fully refundable. The sales agent refused to budge. Luckily I had taken all these screen shots (a legacy of years of dealing with QF) and quoted Australian Consumer Law at them very confidently until she agreed to escalate it to a manager - who just caved in and gave me the refund I was entitled to. I found this very stressful and it totally cheesed me off. I was already cheesed off that my longed for family holiday was not going to happen, and then this was just the last straw. I was ready to cancel the whole trip and just not go.
View attachment 351088
Spoiler Alert: I did not cancel the whole trip. We did go, and we had a fabulous time.
More to follow.
Last edited:
HirafuHeartAttack
Member
- Joined
- May 10, 2022
- Posts
- 223
- Qantas
- Platinum
- Virgin
- Platinum
As a surfer and snowboarder... Yes!
Heart stopping TR so far! Hope you got nuclear amounts of snow like we did in Hokkaido in January! Looking forward to the rest of it.
- Joined
- Sep 20, 2018
- Posts
- 3,365
- Qantas
- Platinum
Wednesday 25 January 2023 - Unexpected Bonus Day in Tokyo - Part 1
Next task - tackle accommodation for our unexpected overnight stay in Tokyo. Booking.com suggested the brand new Hotel Villa Fontaine, which had opened a month before on 21 December 2022. This hotel is directly connected to Haneda Terminal 3 via a new shopping mall and food court area, and it took only about 5-7 minutes to walk over there. It was quite expensive at $250 per night, so we thought I would saunter over and check it out and also see if there was a better rate for walk-ins or for booking directly at the hotel. So I left Mr Seat 0A and Seat Friend in the terminal with all our bags and ski gear, and moseyed on over. Answers to those questions:
Hot-footed it back to the terminal, collected Mr Seat 0A, Seat Friend and all our bags which were loaded on airport trolleys. Just wheeled the whole lot over to the hotel and as check in was not until 3pm (it was now about 0945), we handed the bads and trolleys over to the cloak room and decided to make the most of an unexpected bonus day in Tokyo.
Now this is the first time we have travelled with someone other than family, and Seat Friend was fantastic. She kept her sense of humour, and just rolled with the day as it unfolded. Which I guess was all any of us could do, but it was a good start.
Our first activity was to activate our JR passes for 11 February using the JR Pass Office at Haneda Terminal 3. We usually do not do this because that office does not open until 0645 and always has a really ling queue, and we are always (well until now) on the 0730 bus. So usually we just activate our passes at Nagano train station when we finish skiing. As will be revealed later in this trip report, we probably should have stuck with our usual routine, but at the time it seemed like a good idea. So we lined up, only had to wait about 20 minutes, activated the passes and booked our first journey Matsumoto to Kanazawa on 11 February. Tried to book Kanazawa to Kyoto for 13 February but not permitted - only allowed to book a single trip at this office because they are "too busy" to make multiple bookings. Oh well, we will have to do it at Matsumoto instead, no biggie.
By now, we were all feeling a bit tired (it had been a very long time since we left home in CBR), and were quite gagging for a coffee, so Mr Seat 0A googled and found that there is a Starbucks in Terminal 2 - I know, please don't judge me, the coffee options in Japan are not always the best! So we hopped on the free shuttle bus running between the terminals, and enjoyed a coffee overlooking the runway, taxiways and gates, which was really spectacular. Grande Latte was ¥455 (about $5) and a huge cinnamon scroll was ¥325 (about $3.75) - way way cheaper than in the UAE!
Next we scoped out some lunch places (pretty expensive and quite busy) and visited the omiyage stalls where a few words of Japanese from me always resulted in an invitation to try the various items. Fortified by our coffee and snacks, we decided to catch the monorail (to Hamamatsucho) and then the JR Yamanote line 5-6 stops to Ueno to grab lunch and visit the Don Ki megastore there and stock up on some snacks and drinks for our time in Shiga Kogen. Poor Seat Friend was feeling the pace by now and she dozed the whole way there, which was surprisingly long.
Once there, we decided to stop for lunch as it was by now 1330. So we visited a classic railway fast food Japanese style diner. Our choices were pork katsu, karaage chicken and karaage chicken kare raisu. These ranged in price from ¥1100 to ¥1300, and included all you could eat rice and miso soup, and all you could drink tea or cold tea.
Mr Seat 0A had a disaster with his shoes - the only pair he brought (what a rookie error - obviously not match fit) - so turns out that was another bonus of having the day in Tokyo. He headed off to Mr Minit (in the Ueno station, how convenient) to get it repaired.
Seat Friend and I headed off to Don Ki to buy supplies. We bought 2 x Chōya Umeshu Single Year at ¥998 ea ($35 at home), several medium sized bottles of Mio sparkling sake, nori flavoured chips, various rice crackers, Pocky sticks several flavours, Meiji chocolate, various biscuits, freeze dried fruits and other treats for a total of ¥10,200. Bargain! From prior trips we knew that the dinner and snack options at Shiga Kogen are pretty limited, so we were pleased to have this chance to stock up and make our visit more enjoyable. You can always buy stuff at the 7/11 or Family Mart or Lawson at the stops on the bus trip from the airport to the snow, but this was a much bigger and better selection, at a very competitive price.
Picked up Mr Seat 0A, complete with a repaired shoe, and backtracked all the way to the ariport and to our hotel to check in as it was now well after 1700. But today was not quite finished with us yet.....
Next task - tackle accommodation for our unexpected overnight stay in Tokyo. Booking.com suggested the brand new Hotel Villa Fontaine, which had opened a month before on 21 December 2022. This hotel is directly connected to Haneda Terminal 3 via a new shopping mall and food court area, and it took only about 5-7 minutes to walk over there. It was quite expensive at $250 per night, so we thought I would saunter over and check it out and also see if there was a better rate for walk-ins or for booking directly at the hotel. So I left Mr Seat 0A and Seat Friend in the terminal with all our bags and ski gear, and moseyed on over. Answers to those questions:
- the hotel is absolutely beautiful and the rooms are quite nice and spacious by Japanese standards
- there is no discount for walk in or booking direct - in fact we would save over $80 per room per night by using booking.com. So I sat in their foyer, used their wifi and booked 2 rooms using booking.com.
Hot-footed it back to the terminal, collected Mr Seat 0A, Seat Friend and all our bags which were loaded on airport trolleys. Just wheeled the whole lot over to the hotel and as check in was not until 3pm (it was now about 0945), we handed the bads and trolleys over to the cloak room and decided to make the most of an unexpected bonus day in Tokyo.
Now this is the first time we have travelled with someone other than family, and Seat Friend was fantastic. She kept her sense of humour, and just rolled with the day as it unfolded. Which I guess was all any of us could do, but it was a good start.
Our first activity was to activate our JR passes for 11 February using the JR Pass Office at Haneda Terminal 3. We usually do not do this because that office does not open until 0645 and always has a really ling queue, and we are always (well until now) on the 0730 bus. So usually we just activate our passes at Nagano train station when we finish skiing. As will be revealed later in this trip report, we probably should have stuck with our usual routine, but at the time it seemed like a good idea. So we lined up, only had to wait about 20 minutes, activated the passes and booked our first journey Matsumoto to Kanazawa on 11 February. Tried to book Kanazawa to Kyoto for 13 February but not permitted - only allowed to book a single trip at this office because they are "too busy" to make multiple bookings. Oh well, we will have to do it at Matsumoto instead, no biggie.
By now, we were all feeling a bit tired (it had been a very long time since we left home in CBR), and were quite gagging for a coffee, so Mr Seat 0A googled and found that there is a Starbucks in Terminal 2 - I know, please don't judge me, the coffee options in Japan are not always the best! So we hopped on the free shuttle bus running between the terminals, and enjoyed a coffee overlooking the runway, taxiways and gates, which was really spectacular. Grande Latte was ¥455 (about $5) and a huge cinnamon scroll was ¥325 (about $3.75) - way way cheaper than in the UAE!
Next we scoped out some lunch places (pretty expensive and quite busy) and visited the omiyage stalls where a few words of Japanese from me always resulted in an invitation to try the various items. Fortified by our coffee and snacks, we decided to catch the monorail (to Hamamatsucho) and then the JR Yamanote line 5-6 stops to Ueno to grab lunch and visit the Don Ki megastore there and stock up on some snacks and drinks for our time in Shiga Kogen. Poor Seat Friend was feeling the pace by now and she dozed the whole way there, which was surprisingly long.
Once there, we decided to stop for lunch as it was by now 1330. So we visited a classic railway fast food Japanese style diner. Our choices were pork katsu, karaage chicken and karaage chicken kare raisu. These ranged in price from ¥1100 to ¥1300, and included all you could eat rice and miso soup, and all you could drink tea or cold tea.
Mr Seat 0A had a disaster with his shoes - the only pair he brought (what a rookie error - obviously not match fit
) - so turns out that was another bonus of having the day in Tokyo. He headed off to Mr Minit (in the Ueno station, how convenient) to get it repaired.Seat Friend and I headed off to Don Ki to buy supplies. We bought 2 x Chōya Umeshu Single Year at ¥998 ea ($35 at home), several medium sized bottles of Mio sparkling sake, nori flavoured chips, various rice crackers, Pocky sticks several flavours, Meiji chocolate, various biscuits, freeze dried fruits and other treats for a total of ¥10,200. Bargain! From prior trips we knew that the dinner and snack options at Shiga Kogen are pretty limited, so we were pleased to have this chance to stock up and make our visit more enjoyable. You can always buy stuff at the 7/11 or Family Mart or Lawson at the stops on the bus trip from the airport to the snow, but this was a much bigger and better selection, at a very competitive price.
Picked up Mr Seat 0A, complete with a repaired shoe, and backtracked all the way to the ariport and to our hotel to check in as it was now well after 1700. But today was not quite finished with us yet.....
- Joined
- Sep 20, 2018
- Posts
- 3,365
- Qantas
- Platinum
Forgot to mention that I looked up the snow reports for the two resorts we will visit - Shiga Kogen and Madarao, and I was not disappointed with what I found out - just disappointed that we were not already there enjoying that Japow - 68 cm of freshies anyone???? The temperatures were also pretty chilly, but we have all the right gear, so were not worried by that. We were also thrilled to receive a lovely email from our accommodation in Shiga Kogen acknowledging our delayed arrival, confirming that we would still be welcomed tomorrow, and regretting that they could not refund our missed night's accommodation (which we did not ask them to do - we will claim on travel insurance).
The Frequent Flyer Concierge team takes the hard work out of finding reward seat availability. Using their expert knowledge and specialised tools, they'll help you book a great trip that maximises the value for your points.
- Joined
- Sep 20, 2018
- Posts
- 3,365
- Qantas
- Platinum
Wednesday 25 January 2023 - Unexpected Bonus Day in Tokyo - Part 1
Arrived back to reception and walked up to the desk to check in. No, sorry madam, you must do contactless check in at the check in machine. Select English on the machine and try to check in. No deal. Tried again. Still no deal . Staff member comes over and supervises my third attempt, but still no deal . Staff member tries to check me in herself. Nope, not working properly . Staff member refers to supervisor, who explains something in detail with much bowing, head nodding and "hai, hai sō desu" and the staff member tries again. Still not checking in . So the supervisor has a go himself. Same result - no check in . Supervisor is preparing to have a seventh go (so far this has taken almost 45 minutes) when Seat Friend loses it! "Nope!" she said. "We have done all that several times and it did not work. We are very tired. Please just check us in!" OK done and sorted in less than 3 minutes
Re-claimed our luggage, leaving the ski bags in the cloak room on the trolleys (as advised by the helpful concierge - "so you will have them in the morning") and up to our rooms by about 1800. What a long day it has been
Seat Friend and I decided to visit the beautiful in house onsen Izumi Tenku no Yu using the hotel guest price of ¥1600 (less than $20) rather than the general public rate of ¥4800 (nearly $50). Wow! It was amazing. There were three indoor pools:
After we finished, we dressed in the hotel issue PJs and sat on recliner chairs in the "relaxing room" and looked out at the skyline. As we left, the Japanese staff commented how nice it was for friends to wear the PJs together and experience the onsen together - such a Japanese set of sentiments. We were now totally relaxed and ready for a good night's sleep.
Mr Seat 0A had skipped the onsen and bought himself a beer and a tonkatsu sando from the Lawson.
We were now totally ready to hit the hay (at 2030!) and have a good night's sleep so we were ready for whatever tomorrow held.
Arrived back to reception and walked up to the desk to check in. No, sorry madam, you must do contactless check in at the check in machine. Select English on the machine and try to check in. No deal
. Tried again. Still no deal . Staff member comes over and supervises my third attempt, but still no deal . Staff member tries to check me in herself. Nope, not working properly . Staff member refers to supervisor, who explains something in detail with much bowing, head nodding and "hai, hai sō desu" and the staff member tries again. Still not checking in . So the supervisor has a go himself. Same result - no check in . Supervisor is preparing to have a seventh go (so far this has taken almost 45 minutes) when Seat Friend loses it! "Nope!" she said. "We have done all that several times and it did not work. We are very tired. Please just check us in!" OK done and sorted in less than 3 minutes Re-claimed our luggage, leaving the ski bags in the cloak room on the trolleys (as advised by the helpful concierge - "so you will have them in the morning") and up to our rooms by about 1800. What a long day it has been
Seat Friend and I decided to visit the beautiful in house onsen Izumi Tenku no Yu using the hotel guest price of ¥1600 (less than $20) rather than the general public rate of ¥4800 (nearly $50). Wow! It was amazing. There were three indoor pools:
- 36⁰ soda bath -felt really slippery and lovely
- 40⁰ soak
- 15⁰ cold soak
- 41⁰ soak
- 43⁰ soak
- 39⁰ lie down bath
After we finished, we dressed in the hotel issue PJs and sat on recliner chairs in the "relaxing room" and looked out at the skyline. As we left, the Japanese staff commented how nice it was for friends to wear the PJs together and experience the onsen together - such a Japanese set of sentiments. We were now totally relaxed and ready for a good night's sleep.
Mr Seat 0A had skipped the onsen and bought himself a beer and a tonkatsu sando from the Lawson.
We were now totally ready to hit the hay (at 2030!) and have a good night's sleep so we were ready for whatever tomorrow held.
- Joined
- Sep 20, 2018
- Posts
- 3,365
- Qantas
- Platinum
Thursday 26 January 2023 - Tokyo-Shiga Kogen
Check in for our bus is at 0715, but we were up at 0600 for the anticipated difficulties (after our debacle of a check in) with the automated check out - and yes, they eventuated! In the end after 3 goes on the automated system, we just insisted on a manual check out. Felt like a bit of a bully with the very mild receptionist, but really....Collected all out luggage, hoiked it onto the trolleys and made our way back to the Haneda Terminal 3 for check in for Nagano Snow Shuttle.
No time to even grab a quick snack from the Lawson on the way and only just made the check in time
Pleasant staff helped load all the luggage and a multitude of ski and board bags. There was so much luggage, they had to use the first couple of rows of seating to fit everything in. As you would expect after the cancellations yesterday, the bus was very full. so we had a delayed departure by about 20 minutes, and once again I was felling a bit anxious about making our connecting bus to Shiga Kogen in Nagano (40 minutes allowed on the ticket). I don't think we will make the supermarket at Nagano for fruit, cheese and yoghurt - the only things missing from our "eclectic dinners in Shiga Kogen" menu list (more on this in a later post).
The trip felt very familiar - hardly surprising as we have made this trip in 2017, 2018 and 2020, so are old hands. We stopped for a short break at our regular highway rest area about 1 hr 45 mins out of Tokyo, where our prior knowledge came in handy. Plan of attack - everyone runs to the loo before it gets too busy. Then I would hunt for breakfast and other snacks/pastries, and Mr Seat 0A and Seat Friend would go to Starbucks for coffee/hot chocolate for the trip. They succeeded and I got some lovely pastries - a cheese custard pastry (yes it was good), melon bread (a speciality of the area) and apple turnovers. So we felt very happy to get this for breakfast. It was slow going with heavy snow fall and banks of cleared snow all around. We were now 30 mins behind schedule.
A bit further down the road we made our second stop of the trip at a new 7/11 where we paid over the odds for some fruit, cheese, ham and yoghurt.
Arrived at JR Nagano 30 minutes behind schedule with just 10 minutes to collect our bags and walk all the way to the other end of the bus interchange for our connection to Shiga Kogen. All the bags came off the bus - except for my suitcase which did not re-appear. We knew it was on the bus, because we had seen it loaded, so I used the Apple AirTag for the first real test to locate it in the back of one of the luggage bays of the bus - not sure why it was missed, but anyway, glad to have it. By now, we had 5 mins remaining, so a very quick sprint to connect to the Nagaden bus to Shiga Kogen. It was not much fun pulling ski bags through several hundred meters of heavily snow covered pavement, but we got there in the end - just in time to see the jam packed bus close its luggage bays and pull out. Stress level rising very quickly until the company rep said not to worry, another bus would come very soon. And so it did, less than 5 minutes later.
This worked out very well for us as this second bus was lightly loaded and we had a great choice of seats and room to spread out. By the time we arrived at Prince Hotel East, we were the only pax left, so it was effectively our private taxi for the last 20 minutes or so. Arrived at 1415 and expected to be made to wait for check in at 1500 - but bonus of cancelling the night before with no refund, our rooms had been held for us and we were able to check in immediately. Unpacked and I felt so tired I had a short nap - signs of the impending leukaekmia, I now know.
Caught the hotel shuttle up to Ichinose at 1700 to visit the one local konbini store looking for fresh milk for our cuppa. Also hoping for some dinner as with all the travel and transit issues, we had somehow missed lunch. We had to wait until restuarant (one of only two that were operating at Ichinose) opened at 1800 and we got an excellent yaktitori set for ¥2420, which was delicious and very welcome.
Shuttled back to hotel, a wonderful soak in our private Japanese style bathroom and early to sleep ready to hit the slopes tomorrow morning. Totally thrilled to look out our window and see the snow pelting down.
I will write a separate post about the eccentricities of Shiga Kogen as a resort later on in this TR. Great skiing, amazing actually, but not much else there despite it being totally huge.
Check in for our bus is at 0715, but we were up at 0600 for the anticipated difficulties (after our debacle of a check in) with the automated check out - and yes, they eventuated! In the end after 3 goes on the automated system, we just insisted on a manual check out. Felt like a bit of a bully with the very mild receptionist, but really....Collected all out luggage, hoiked it onto the trolleys and made our way back to the Haneda Terminal 3 for check in for Nagano Snow Shuttle.
No time to even grab a quick snack from the Lawson on the way and only just made the check in time
Pleasant staff helped load all the luggage and a multitude of ski and board bags. There was so much luggage, they had to use the first couple of rows of seating to fit everything in. As you would expect after the cancellations yesterday, the bus was very full. so we had a delayed departure by about 20 minutes, and once again I was felling a bit anxious about making our connecting bus to Shiga Kogen in Nagano (40 minutes allowed on the ticket). I don't think we will make the supermarket at Nagano for fruit, cheese and yoghurt - the only things missing from our "eclectic dinners in Shiga Kogen" menu list (more on this in a later post).
The trip felt very familiar - hardly surprising as we have made this trip in 2017, 2018 and 2020, so are old hands. We stopped for a short break at our regular highway rest area about 1 hr 45 mins out of Tokyo, where our prior knowledge came in handy. Plan of attack - everyone runs to the loo before it gets too busy. Then I would hunt for breakfast and other snacks/pastries, and Mr Seat 0A and Seat Friend would go to Starbucks for coffee/hot chocolate for the trip. They succeeded and I got some lovely pastries - a cheese custard pastry (yes it was good), melon bread (a speciality of the area) and apple turnovers. So we felt very happy to get this for breakfast. It was slow going with heavy snow fall and banks of cleared snow all around. We were now 30 mins behind schedule.
A bit further down the road we made our second stop of the trip at a new 7/11 where we paid over the odds for some fruit, cheese, ham and yoghurt.
Arrived at JR Nagano 30 minutes behind schedule with just 10 minutes to collect our bags and walk all the way to the other end of the bus interchange for our connection to Shiga Kogen. All the bags came off the bus - except for my suitcase which did not re-appear. We knew it was on the bus, because we had seen it loaded, so I used the Apple AirTag for the first real test to locate it in the back of one of the luggage bays of the bus - not sure why it was missed, but anyway, glad to have it. By now, we had 5 mins remaining, so a very quick sprint to connect to the Nagaden bus to Shiga Kogen. It was not much fun pulling ski bags through several hundred meters of heavily snow covered pavement, but we got there in the end - just in time to see the jam packed bus close its luggage bays and pull out. Stress level rising very quickly until the company rep said not to worry, another bus would come very soon. And so it did, less than 5 minutes later.
This worked out very well for us as this second bus was lightly loaded and we had a great choice of seats and room to spread out. By the time we arrived at Prince Hotel East, we were the only pax left, so it was effectively our private taxi for the last 20 minutes or so. Arrived at 1415 and expected to be made to wait for check in at 1500 - but bonus of cancelling the night before with no refund, our rooms had been held for us and we were able to check in immediately. Unpacked and I felt so tired I had a short nap - signs of the impending leukaekmia, I now know.
Caught the hotel shuttle up to Ichinose at 1700 to visit the one local konbini store looking for fresh milk for our cuppa. Also hoping for some dinner as with all the travel and transit issues, we had somehow missed lunch. We had to wait until restuarant (one of only two that were operating at Ichinose) opened at 1800 and we got an excellent yaktitori set for ¥2420, which was delicious and very welcome.
Shuttled back to hotel, a wonderful soak in our private Japanese style bathroom and early to sleep ready to hit the slopes tomorrow morning. Totally thrilled to look out our window and see the snow pelting down.
I will write a separate post about the eccentricities of Shiga Kogen as a resort later on in this TR. Great skiing, amazing actually, but not much else there despite it being totally huge.
- Joined
- Sep 20, 2018
- Posts
- 3,365
- Qantas
- Platinum
Friday 27 January - Tuesday 31 January 2023 - Skiing at Shiga Kogen - Some Information About the Shiga Kogen Resort
In case anyone is interested...We have made 6 ski trips to Japan since 2010, counting this trip.
Shiga Kogen is a massive ski resort on the main island of Japan, about 1½ hrs from Nagano by bus. It is made up of 18 separate ski resorts that have joined together under a single lift ticket, which cost us ¥5,600 (about $60) as over 60 seniors and was ¥6,500 (about $70) for adults. I just checked and prices for the upcoming season (2023/24) have gone up a bit to ¥6,400 for seniors and ¥7,500 for adults. Still way cheaper and way better than any resort in Australia or the USA! The main "village" area of the resort is at a place called Ichinose (pronounced i-chi-no-say, not Itchy nose)!! Ichinose has a post office, a bus terminal, a small konbini, a couple of very Japanese hotels, two ski shops and a couple of restaurants open for dinner and a further half dozen or so open for lunch only. There used to be a better choice of maybe 5-6 restaurants pre-COVID, but seems like most are still closed, maybe permanently.
www.japan-guide.com
We are staying at the Prince Hotel East at Yakebitaiyama, which is in the northern (more remote) area of the resort. We paid $2,900 (approx) for 7 nights room only in a very spacious room 29 sq m) with a beautiful Japanese style bathroom, booked before Japan had opened to foreign tourists, but able to be cancelled for free up to 2 days before check in. This is a beautiful luxury hotel, completely ski in/ski out, with amazong views out over the ski fields from your big picture window.
But...it does not have an onsen. They only offer buffet style food, and the cost of meals here is prohibitive with breakfast at $40 per person and dinner a steal at only $99 per person! It has coin operated laundry (often overrun with families visiting from other Prince Hotels at the resort), some vending machines, a small and expensive convenience style hotel shop, no place to get coffee, and ski waxing that takes 24 hours and costs $50 per set of skis. It's our second stay at this hotel so we were aware of these quirks.
Our plan to deal with the quirks included bringing individual serve sachets of porridge from home that we ate in the room for breakfast (just added boiling water from the kettle and a bit of milk we bought at the road stops yesterday), along with some fruit and yoghurt picked up at the convenience stores along the way or in Ichinose. This was followed by a mid morning coffee and pastry somewhere on the slopes around 1100 and then we ate a big, late lunch each day around 1430. "Dinner" was to be snacks and drinks (from our Tokyo stash) in our rooms, and then we played cards or board games with Seat Friend. If we could be bothered, we would go up to Ichinose on the hotel shuttle to visit a restaurant - but as we found out yesterday only 2 were operating at this time, and as I keep foreshadowing, with my impending leukaemia diagnosis I was experiencing significant exhaustion, so in fact we did not go up to Ichinose other than on our first night as described previously. We brought our own cold wax to apply to skis and made sure to arrive from Aus with them pre-waxed. It's not ideal, but in our opnion it's totally worth it for the fabulous skiing.
Prince offers two other hotels - West and South. West is marketed as "family friendly" and it has an onsen and a big dining area that sells more affordable food. You can catch the Prince Hotel free shuttle to/from East if you want to eat here, but you can only use the onsen if you are staying at West. We asked to see the rooms - they are much smaller (19 sq m) and pretty old and tired, but also ski in/ski out. South is definitely for the young backpacker set, with dorm style rooms and a "young and broke uni student" vibe.
Here is my typical lunch at West. A standard set like this (included free Japanese tea or filter coffee) was between ¥1,100 - ¥1,300. This is a pretty standard price all over Japan, and I love that the Japanese ski resorts do not gouge on pricing the way they do at Australian ski resorts.
If anyone wants to ask more questions about any of these resorts, I'm happy to answer to the best of my ability in this thread or by private message.
Edit: typos
In case anyone is interested...We have made 6 ski trips to Japan since 2010, counting this trip.
- The first one was to Niseko on Hokkaido in 2010. Suffice to say it did not live up to the hype for us - we were unlucky with the weather. We had 2 great days, then it got really warm (around 2-4⁰) and the snow started to melt, as did all the built up snow on the footpaths and roofs in town. Then a polar blast came through, it went fromwarm to freezing (around -15⁰) and everything forze to solid ice with a small layer of snow about 5 cm on the top. Very dangerous, particularly in town where ypu needed cat tracks to even move a step or two on the footpath and most unpleasant on the slopes with blizzard strength winds and very limited visibility. We have not been back, although the original plan for this trip was to try Niseko again.
- 2015, we skied up the top of the Hakuba valley at Norikura, Kortina and Tsugaike. These were great fun, plenty of snow, good conditions and not too crowded, but extremely limited for food choices, no apres ski at all, limited accommodation. Very Japanese. We literally only saw one Swedish family and no other Westerners for our whole stay. it snowed gently most nights, 5-10 cm each morning to make fresh tracks.
- 2017, we skiied firstly at Hakuba Happo One and then at Nozawa Onsen! Hakuba Happo One had a mid-size modern Japanese village with plenty of food choices, the only onsens were attached to various hotels, a huge ski resort, good snow conditions, very long runs, a LOT of Australians, mainly of the Jetstar set. Nozawa Onsen was a beautiful traditional Japanese village with heaps of food choices, lots of onsens, great slopes, great snow conditions and hardly any Australians. It snowed overnight about 10 cm most nights, amazing.
- 2018 Nozawa Onsen - we loved it so much, we went back! Noticed a few more Australians.
- 2020 Nozawa Onsen and Shiga Kogen. Well ypu know why we went to Nozawa again! Unfortunately, a lot more loud Australians this time, but otherwise all the things we loved except it was a poor snow season and some of the lower runs had patches of dirt. Shiga Kogen was to try something new. We loved the skiing there - magic conditions, long runs, spectacular scenery. Just great. But there is no village of Shiga Kogen - it's really just a collection of resorts without a true village other than the very tiny Ichinose (see below for more on this). Very Japanese - we barely saw anyone Western for the whole trip.
- 2023 - Shiga Kogen again because we loved it, and Madarao to try something new. Our impressions will be covered in this report.
Shiga Kogen is a massive ski resort on the main island of Japan, about 1½ hrs from Nagano by bus. It is made up of 18 separate ski resorts that have joined together under a single lift ticket, which cost us ¥5,600 (about $60) as over 60 seniors and was ¥6,500 (about $70) for adults. I just checked and prices for the upcoming season (2023/24) have gone up a bit to ¥6,400 for seniors and ¥7,500 for adults. Still way cheaper and way better than any resort in Australia or the USA! The main "village" area of the resort is at a place called Ichinose (pronounced i-chi-no-say, not Itchy nose)!! Ichinose has a post office, a bus terminal, a small konbini, a couple of very Japanese hotels, two ski shops and a couple of restaurants open for dinner and a further half dozen or so open for lunch only. There used to be a better choice of maybe 5-6 restaurants pre-COVID, but seems like most are still closed, maybe permanently.
Shiga Kogen Ski Resort
Travel guide for the Shiga Kogen Ski Area in eastern Nagano Prefecture, Japan.
We are staying at the Prince Hotel East at Yakebitaiyama, which is in the northern (more remote) area of the resort. We paid $2,900 (approx) for 7 nights room only in a very spacious room 29 sq m) with a beautiful Japanese style bathroom, booked before Japan had opened to foreign tourists, but able to be cancelled for free up to 2 days before check in. This is a beautiful luxury hotel, completely ski in/ski out, with amazong views out over the ski fields from your big picture window.
But...it does not have an onsen. They only offer buffet style food, and the cost of meals here is prohibitive with breakfast at $40 per person and dinner a steal at only $99 per person! It has coin operated laundry (often overrun with families visiting from other Prince Hotels at the resort), some vending machines, a small and expensive convenience style hotel shop, no place to get coffee, and ski waxing that takes 24 hours and costs $50 per set of skis
. It's our second stay at this hotel so we were aware of these quirks.Our plan to deal with the quirks included bringing individual serve sachets of porridge from home that we ate in the room for breakfast (just added boiling water from the kettle and a bit of milk we bought at the road stops yesterday), along with some fruit and yoghurt picked up at the convenience stores along the way or in Ichinose. This was followed by a mid morning coffee and pastry somewhere on the slopes around 1100 and then we ate a big, late lunch each day around 1430. "Dinner" was to be snacks and drinks (from our Tokyo stash) in our rooms, and then we played cards or board games with Seat Friend. If we could be bothered, we would go up to Ichinose on the hotel shuttle to visit a restaurant - but as we found out yesterday only 2 were operating at this time, and as I keep foreshadowing, with my impending leukaemia diagnosis I was experiencing significant exhaustion, so in fact we did not go up to Ichinose other than on our first night as described previously. We brought our own cold wax to apply to skis and made sure to arrive from Aus with them pre-waxed. It's not ideal, but in our opnion it's totally worth it for the fabulous skiing.
Prince offers two other hotels - West and South. West is marketed as "family friendly" and it has an onsen and a big dining area that sells more affordable food. You can catch the Prince Hotel free shuttle to/from East if you want to eat here, but you can only use the onsen if you are staying at West. We asked to see the rooms - they are much smaller (19 sq m) and pretty old and tired, but also ski in/ski out. South is definitely for the young backpacker set, with dorm style rooms and a "young and broke uni student" vibe.
Here is my typical lunch at West. A standard set like this (included free Japanese tea or filter coffee) was between ¥1,100 - ¥1,300. This is a pretty standard price all over Japan, and I love that the Japanese ski resorts do not gouge on pricing the way they do at Australian ski resorts.
If anyone wants to ask more questions about any of these resorts, I'm happy to answer to the best of my ability in this thread or by private message.
Edit: typos
- Joined
- Sep 20, 2018
- Posts
- 3,365
- Qantas
- Platinum
Friday 27 January - Tuesday 31 January 2023 - Skiing at Shiga Kogen
I've included a marked up trail map below showing the parts of Shiga Kogen resort that we visited.
Friday
First night here is snowed 10-15cm overnight on top of the storm dump, so conditions were magnificent, although very cold at -10⁰ at the base of the gondola and -15⁰ at the top station. Luckily there is no wind and we have the right gear. Looks like a great day ahead. Starting just before 0900, we found lots of beautiful soft snow and made our way over to Ichinose. Sadly the beautiful tree area of Terakoya was closed - too much snow and the lifts needed digging out - maybe they will open for the weekend? Lunch today at Prince West (photo on previous post). Headed home about 1530. I'm exhausted so snack dinner, bath and early to bed. Heavy snow falling again, so looks good for tomorrow.
Saturday
Yes! 35 cm of snow overnight!! But it's cloudy and poor viz today so I took a later start at 1030 and took full advantage of my pink lens goggles. They really make a huge difference for me in low light conditions. Mr Seat 0A and Seat Friend headed out at the usual time of 0900 and met me at the top of the gondola at 1045 when it was a balmy -13⁰. We headed over to Okushiga, the most northerly part of the resort, which is fantastic - Nagano Winter Olympics 1998 venue. What amazing runs. Into a weird 1970s yurt style hotel there for an amazing coffee - so good we lingered for a second cup despite paying ¥750 for a very small cup. Afternoon was a re-run of the morning and back to hotel around 1600, realising we had missed lunch. Planned to go up to Ichinose, but again I piked it and we just ate snacks and had an early night. Weekends were not a problem at Okushiga, with no line anywhere except the main Okushiga gondola. Ski on-ski off gets quite tiring!
Sunday
Bluebird day that was not in the forecast althoug still cold at -12⁰ inside the gondola cabin. Skiied to Ichinose (where we had the most abysmal coffee ever at "Hi Happy" restaurant. Not happy at all. It was awful - lukewarm sludge) and then on to Tanne no Mori, the beautiful tree lined trails all the way through to Takamagahara. Here we found out favourite lunch restaurant was still operating - yahoo! But it was ony 1100 so we pressed on to Higashitateyama in the hope of coffee and pastry at The Rooftop. We managed, bt the ordering process was so slow, and preparing the coffee was so slow that we were there for almost an hour before we got our coffees (¥550 ea for a mug- much more reasonable). Luckily, it was beautiful there with rows and rows of snow capped alps. Just glorious.
It was a very long ski back to our lunch stop, and we were a bit anxious that it would be closed because it was 1445 when we got back. Luckily they were open until 1500, so we slammed down lunch and then skied back to the hotel, again arriving a bit after 1600. We had Umeshu and nori potato chips for dinner/snack, and then played a few board games, a cuppa and a biscuit and early to bed again. I really feel exhausted.
Monday
Another beautiful bluebird morning so once again we leapt out of bed early (HA! I so totally DID NOT). It actually went like this:
Me, hopefully: "What's the weather like to day honey?"
Him: "It's gorgeous. We have to get up and ski!"
Me: "oh cough!"
Still we were on the gondola to the top of Yakebitaiyama at 0915, so good effort! Straight over to Okushiga where the gondolar run was just sublime. Beautiful soft snow staying light atn dry at -10⁰. No moguls and virtually no one else on the run, and it is a long, long run. We did it again, and then a third time, and one more for good luck. Then into St Christophe's at the base for hot chocolate and melon bread for morning tea at the big picture windows. Spectacular.
Visited the gift shop and parted with a bit of cash and after a slightly extended morning tea break, came out to find that the predicted change in the weather was imminent with cloud rolling in, the light noticeably flatter and light snow starting to fall. Changed to my pink lens goggles in the gondola on the way up.
Did the top chair a couple of times and then started the long trek to our lunch spot over at Takamagahara. Some of our lunch selections.
When we came out, snow was just pelting down - very dry and light, but so heavy it accumulated on our clothes and helmets on the chair lifts. At least 10cm had fallen and viz was very poor, so after giving myself a very strict talking to about good technique and not losing confidence, we tackled the long runs back to the hotel, with a stop in Ichinose village to buy milk at the konbini - our boots went squeak, squeak, squeak. Shop closed, so squeak, squeak, squeak all the way back to our skis. By now it was around 15-20cm of fresh snow, and what an experience to have freshies in boot high powder in the afternoon on a mountain devoid of other people. it is so beautiful to watch someone ski in these conditions - snow flying up around the knees and the skier just seeming to glide. I did my best ever powder skiing, the fulfilment of a lifetime goal to ski powder competently. Today might possibly have been the best day of skiing I have ever had - it's certainly in the top few anyway. A few more shots of the day.
At the bottom, I made a snow angel video for my little granddaughter. Then in to warm up abput 1615.
An evening of domestics, doing the washing, waxing the skis, a long hot bath and snack dinner followed by - you guessed it, another early night. Oh and the snow has continued to fall heavily all evening.
Tuesday - last day at Shiga Kogen
Woke up to 30 cm of new snow and still snowing lightly this morning. Poor viz, so a slightly later start, but over at Okushiga by 1000. The gondola run wasn't as nice as yesterday mainly due to the poor viz and heavy build up of snow in odd places that were hard to see in the light. Nonetheless, we did 3 great runs down it, with the sun popping out every now and then to taunt us of how fabulous it would be if you could actually see!
Into St Christophe's for lunch again, variously karaage and tonkatsu. I was feeling exhausted and decided to go in after lunch, but.... on the way back the sun came out and it was so sweet we decided to do a few more runs, do some deep snow practice and take photos and videos. This did involve a few face plants - but what happens at Shiga stays at Shiga, right. No damage to anyone, and lots of fun.
The snow looked spectacular glinting and glistening in the sunlight, with gentle glitter snow still falling, like being on the inside of a snow globe. it was very hard to leave.
Boy do I hate packing!
I've included a marked up trail map below showing the parts of Shiga Kogen resort that we visited.
Friday
First night here is snowed 10-15cm overnight on top of the storm dump, so conditions were magnificent, although very cold at -10⁰ at the base of the gondola and -15⁰ at the top station. Luckily there is no wind and we have the right gear. Looks like a great day ahead. Starting just before 0900, we found lots of beautiful soft snow and made our way over to Ichinose. Sadly the beautiful tree area of Terakoya was closed - too much snow and the lifts needed digging out - maybe they will open for the weekend? Lunch today at Prince West (photo on previous post). Headed home about 1530. I'm exhausted so snack dinner, bath and early to bed. Heavy snow falling again, so looks good for tomorrow.
Saturday
Yes! 35 cm of snow overnight!! But it's cloudy and poor viz today so I took a later start at 1030 and took full advantage of my pink lens goggles. They really make a huge difference for me in low light conditions. Mr Seat 0A and Seat Friend headed out at the usual time of 0900 and met me at the top of the gondola at 1045 when it was a balmy -13⁰. We headed over to Okushiga, the most northerly part of the resort, which is fantastic - Nagano Winter Olympics 1998 venue. What amazing runs. Into a weird 1970s yurt style hotel there for an amazing coffee - so good we lingered for a second cup despite paying ¥750 for a very small cup. Afternoon was a re-run of the morning and back to hotel around 1600, realising we had missed lunch. Planned to go up to Ichinose, but again I piked it and we just ate snacks and had an early night. Weekends were not a problem at Okushiga, with no line anywhere except the main Okushiga gondola. Ski on-ski off gets quite tiring!
Sunday
Bluebird day that was not in the forecast althoug still cold at -12⁰ inside the gondola cabin. Skiied to Ichinose (where we had the most abysmal coffee ever at "Hi Happy" restaurant. Not happy at all. It was awful - lukewarm sludge) and then on to Tanne no Mori, the beautiful tree lined trails all the way through to Takamagahara. Here we found out favourite lunch restaurant was still operating - yahoo! But it was ony 1100 so we pressed on to Higashitateyama in the hope of coffee and pastry at The Rooftop. We managed, bt the ordering process was so slow, and preparing the coffee was so slow that we were there for almost an hour before we got our coffees (¥550 ea for a mug- much more reasonable). Luckily, it was beautiful there with rows and rows of snow capped alps. Just glorious.
It was a very long ski back to our lunch stop, and we were a bit anxious that it would be closed because it was 1445 when we got back. Luckily they were open until 1500, so we slammed down lunch and then skied back to the hotel, again arriving a bit after 1600. We had Umeshu and nori potato chips for dinner/snack, and then played a few board games, a cuppa and a biscuit and early to bed again. I really feel exhausted.
Monday
Another beautiful bluebird morning so once again we leapt out of bed early (HA! I so totally DID NOT). It actually went like this:
Me, hopefully: "What's the weather like to day honey?"
Him: "It's gorgeous. We have to get up and ski!"
Me: "oh cough!"
Still we were on the gondola to the top of Yakebitaiyama at 0915, so good effort! Straight over to Okushiga where the gondolar run was just sublime. Beautiful soft snow staying light atn dry at -10⁰. No moguls and virtually no one else on the run, and it is a long, long run. We did it again, and then a third time, and one more for good luck. Then into St Christophe's at the base for hot chocolate and melon bread for morning tea at the big picture windows. Spectacular.
Visited the gift shop and parted with a bit of cash and after a slightly extended morning tea break, came out to find that the predicted change in the weather was imminent with cloud rolling in, the light noticeably flatter and light snow starting to fall. Changed to my pink lens goggles in the gondola on the way up.
Did the top chair a couple of times and then started the long trek to our lunch spot over at Takamagahara. Some of our lunch selections.
When we came out, snow was just pelting down - very dry and light, but so heavy it accumulated on our clothes and helmets on the chair lifts. At least 10cm had fallen and viz was very poor, so after giving myself a very strict talking to about good technique and not losing confidence, we tackled the long runs back to the hotel, with a stop in Ichinose village to buy milk at the konbini - our boots went squeak, squeak, squeak. Shop closed, so squeak, squeak, squeak all the way back to our skis. By now it was around 15-20cm of fresh snow, and what an experience to have freshies in boot high powder in the afternoon on a mountain devoid of other people. it is so beautiful to watch someone ski in these conditions - snow flying up around the knees and the skier just seeming to glide. I did my best ever powder skiing, the fulfilment of a lifetime goal to ski powder competently. Today might possibly have been the best day of skiing I have ever had - it's certainly in the top few anyway. A few more shots of the day.
At the bottom, I made a snow angel video for my little granddaughter. Then in to warm up abput 1615.
An evening of domestics, doing the washing, waxing the skis, a long hot bath and snack dinner followed by - you guessed it, another early night. Oh and the snow has continued to fall heavily all evening.
Tuesday - last day at Shiga Kogen
Woke up to 30 cm of new snow and still snowing lightly this morning. Poor viz, so a slightly later start, but over at Okushiga by 1000. The gondola run wasn't as nice as yesterday mainly due to the poor viz and heavy build up of snow in odd places that were hard to see in the light. Nonetheless, we did 3 great runs down it, with the sun popping out every now and then to taunt us of how fabulous it would be if you could actually see!
Into St Christophe's for lunch again, variously karaage and tonkatsu. I was feeling exhausted and decided to go in after lunch, but.... on the way back the sun came out and it was so sweet we decided to do a few more runs, do some deep snow practice and take photos and videos. This did involve a few face plants - but what happens at Shiga stays at Shiga, right
. No damage to anyone, and lots of fun.The snow looked spectacular glinting and glistening in the sunlight, with gentle glitter snow still falling, like being on the inside of a snow globe. it was very hard to leave.
Boy do I hate packing!
- Joined
- Sep 20, 2018
- Posts
- 3,365
- Qantas
- Platinum
I am loving re-living this trip. But at the same time, it is making me feel pretty sad that our planned and booked trip to Nozawa Onsen and Shiga Kogen plus 2 weeks of touring for Jan-Feb 2024 is likely to be scuttled by the leukaemia.
Still, never say never as I seem to be making slightly faster progress towards a new immune system than predicted by the doctors... Fingers crossed for a speedy recovery and the ability to get insurance.
Still, never say never as I seem to be making slightly faster progress towards a new immune system than predicted by the doctors... Fingers crossed for a speedy recovery and the ability to get insurance.
Fifa
Established Member
- Joined
- Sep 17, 2006
- Posts
- 2,108
Thanks for your terrific TR! Brings back great memories.
We stayed for 10 nights at Shiga Kogen Prince West Hotel in Feb this year (third time there). It was a bargain: JPY108,000pp including breakfast, 3 day Yakebitaiyama area lift pass and 6 day senior all mountain lift pass. Yes, rooms are small but gorgeous view and walking distance to Ichinose if you don’t want to wait for the shuttle bus. There is a basic lounge area in the lobby where you can chill out with your own alcohol and snacks, perfect for our group of 9.
We stayed for 10 nights at Shiga Kogen Prince West Hotel in Feb this year (third time there). It was a bargain: JPY108,000pp including breakfast, 3 day Yakebitaiyama area lift pass and 6 day senior all mountain lift pass. Yes, rooms are small but gorgeous view and walking distance to Ichinose if you don’t want to wait for the shuttle bus. There is a basic lounge area in the lobby where you can chill out with your own alcohol and snacks, perfect for our group of 9.
Enhance your AFF viewing experience!!
From just $6 we'll remove all advertisements so that you can enjoy a cleaner and uninterupted viewing experience.And you'll be supporting us so that we can continue to provide this valuable resource :)
Sample AFF with no advertisements? More..
Sample AFF with no advertisements? More..
