Located within the Nagano region of central Honshu, the Hakuba area hosted much of the 1998? winter olympics. We know this because Kanasawa san, an employee of the condo where we're staying, keeps pointing out the grand structure of the ski jump, again and again as he ferries us around to other resorts - ski jumpo! This impressive hunk of concrete and curves is at Happo One resort, just up the road from Hakuba Goryu resort where we're staying. The Shinkansen (bullet train) trip from Tokyo was as quick, quite and comfortable as usual. It terminates in Nagano city, where we had a leisurely lunch before catching a bus for a pleasant enough journey of one hour or so. Winding through small rural towns, farmland and a tunnel, our bus climbs its way into the mountains and on to the Hakuba valley. We chose Hakuba as a destination party on the recommendation of Peter, Karen, Cathryn and Matt. They have skied here before and spoke highly of the beautiful mountain vistas, good choice of resorts and good snow conditions. They are, as I type, speeding their way here and arrive tomorrow afternoon to start their own holiday at another resort Tsugaike Kogen, about 50 mins drive to the north. We skied there today actually, nice area, a bit tame but good fun none the less.
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