Until now I haven’t really had a favourite area to go snowboarding in - I’ve visited a handful of ski resorts across Nagano, Niigata, Gunma, Shimane and Hokkaido - but I’ve just about fallen in love with the Muikamachi area in Niigata.
It’s a little confusing, but Muikamachi technically no longer exists - it’s a “former town” that was merged in with a couple of other towns and is now officially just known as the city of Minamionuma. But Muikamachi still has a distinct identity and its name is used in places like the Muikamachi Hakkaisan Ski resort or the Muikamachi Hutte, not to mention the Muikamachi train station.
Anyway, I feel like the area has the prettiest snow I have ever seen in my life. Of course I don’t have that many reference points, since I grew up in snowless Australia, and Tokyo doesn’t really get much snow either. (But I have visited Hokkaido in winter!)
I think with Muikamachi, it’s just something about the large expanses of snow-covered rice paddies contrasted with the little Japanese-style houses dotted about the place. And of course all the low-lying snow-covered mountains.
Alas, I didn’t really get any good pictures of the scenery - for one we were driving, and for two the roads were surrounded by high walls of snow, so it’s not like we could really pull over. I’m not sure that the area is really conducive to going for a photo walk with how snowy it is, but I am tempted to come back another year in winter with my camera.
To the south of Muikamachi and Minamionuma is the town of Yuzawa, home to the popular Maiko and Gala Yuzawa Ski Resorts. Gala in particular has a Shinkansen right to its door, and I always see ads for it in the train stations so it really is quite popular - it was one of the first ski resorts I ever visited myself.
Muikamachi feels a bit quieter, although it seems they’re putting in effort to get more people to come visit. Around Muikamachi there are 15+ places to get dinner so although it is still on the very rural side compared to Tokyo, it’s not completely dead. I actually like how it feels a bit quieter and chill.
As well as its ski resorts, Muikamachi is also best known for its aforementioned rice paddies which is a major producer of Hoshihikari rice, a premium rice variety in Japan, and also for its Hakkaisan sake.
I’ve never visited Hakuba or Niseko (the two most popular ski resorts for my Australian compatriots) so maybe those ski resorts are actually a lot nicer than what you can get in Muikamachi. I don’t want to spend my day surrounded by Australians though (sorry, not sorry) and I quite like the quieter pace of these local places. So I will definitely be back!
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