As many readers know, in a few days we will attack the spring holiday season “Golden Week”. In Japan there are 3 big vacation periods, and other periods are one week inlucindg 15 Aug and another week at the end of the year. For each period, city dwellers travel long ways, both domectic and overseas. In […]

An American friend, living in Japan, recently forwarded an article on Japanese landscape management which appeared in Japan Times this February. Titled “Why’s Japan grown so ugly?”, the author, Mr. Kevin Rafferty, denounces destruction of natural environments and traditional landscapes accompanying postwar economic developments; 97 percent of rivers dammed, 60 percent of coastline covered in […]

The following report was by Mary from Sydney. Mary and Fred visited Hagiwara after skiing in Niseko, in order to get to know “Japan as it is”.

We had been to Japan only once before when we were looking for a new ski destination,
we had always wanted to return and thought the combination of Japanese […]