I recently finished another great Japan ski trip with the Jase and the rest of the Japan Powder Culture Tour (JPCT) guide team. My first trip was in Feb 2023 and after a fun time then, I went again this year in early Mar 2024. Jase and the all-star guide team have tremendous knowledge all the resorts in the Shiga Kogen / Nagano area and the base village of Yudunaka. Every day the JPCT team puts you on the Japan powder (on and off piste) and gives you the right balance of challenging terrain, fast pace, and helpful instruction as needed. Beyond the great snow, there is a plenty of good camaraderie among fellow skiers & snowboarders, especially if you are a solo traveler looking to ski/ride with others of a similar skill set and passion for powder. I also have to give props to Jase for his fleet of quality rental equipment (very pleased with the powder ski setup he provided). Beyond the time on the snow, Jase always makes sure you have a good time via the cultural activities, team meals, and some great onsen hotels in Yudunaka. Highly recommended!
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My group of 6 had a great week with Jase and his team. The benefit of being able to go to the resort with the best conditions and with a guide to show you the way was worth getting into a crowded bus each morning. The accommodation was very clean and comfortable and the food on offer, especially for dinner, was excellent.
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We are inexperienced powder skiiers. However, Jase and his guides were great matching us with similar standard skiers and were great teaching us new skills and taking us to places we would not go by ourselves. They looked after us very well from picking us up on time, organising our accommodation and ski here to the little things like getting us water at lunch and at the end of the day.
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This tour was the best decision ive ever made to go on. I went solo and absolutely had the most amazing time. Jase and the guides are so amazing and advanced in there teaching, they have so much knowledge of the area and the resorts we visited were amazing everyday. I learnt new skills to take away with me and some of the most amazing people on the tour that i hope to meet up with at sometime somewhere around the world. i honestly cant stop telling people how amazing this trip was...Anybody at any level thinking about doing it just book it..no regrets and ill be back next year
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I took my 13 & 14 year old boys for first Japan ski experience Jan'24. I wanted it to be memorable to them for the fun & good vibes, powder and a little non-touristy genuine culture. Jase & his team delivered on all fronts. The guiding crew are great fun but also very good at their job including safety first, fun & good memories a close second. Jase has amazing energy running the show and legitimately wants his clients to have the best experience, he cares being naturally service oriented. He is very good at ensuring each day the skiing choice is made to maximise the day for all, which for advanced skiers like us was proven by our 5 days being fresh powder found every day despite no snow falls in between! The additional cultural shows were fantastic with genuinely impressive talent. I noticed repeat customers present in the wider groups which says something and the clients Jase has just seem good people so we enjoyed all the group. Jase is also very good at providing good information (including logistics) before hand to set a realistic expectation of what to expect and for help. Thanks Jase and team, you provided wonderful memories for myself and my boys more importantly.
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Solo Skier (intermediate to advanced). I can’t speak highly enough about the quality of this ski trip. Jase and the rest of his guides do an outstanding job in delivering the following features to those who are adventurous enough to book this trip: Powder – lots of it with multiple ski locations in reach, we chased the powder every day. Excellent instruction from his guides – I was able to improve my form and ability during this trip. Wonderful accommodations: traditional Japanese rooms and daily Onsen were a feature of the trip. The Japanese culture features were also a lot of fun. Jase knows how to pack the day and keep it interesting for everyone. I also appreciate that Jase accommodates all levels of skiers, which really makes this trip great for families and couples. Overall the quality and amount of snow was unprecedented. This, in combination with top notch guiding and a good dose of Japanese culture, makes this both a unique experience and some of the best skiing available on the planet. I will definitely return!
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First off what can I say, Japan Powder culture tours exceeded my expectations. Guides Harry, Oscar, Gus and George are all extremely talented skiiers and know all the mountains exceptionally well. Finding untouched powder runs three days after snow and knowing all the right tree and lift runs. With Jase leading the charge in the morning it’s a well organised machine of a team.
I went in as what I thought I was an intermediate boarder by day two the team had corrected my posture, controlled my erratic movements and had me mowing down moguls like a groomer at 2 am.
Well elevating me above my mates allowing me to run rings around all the other ɡaiʑiɴ on the rest of my trip in Niseko.

Thanks again I really appreciate it hope you all have the best season with plenty of Puki Yuki
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We initially reviewed JPCT back in 2016 and it was a very fun time, and now the additional experience is evident because JPCT has evolved into a very well oiled machine. All the logistics were well managed, and communication was tight which was enhanced by whatsapp group messages regarding plans for the day and/or evening.

It was the sort of tour that makes you wonder why people go on a Japan snow trip and just park themselves up at a westernised ski resort for the duration. They miss out on Japanese cultural experiences and miss out on skiing fresh powder run after run.

YUDANAKA
Staying in Yudanaka was fantastic as it’s a real town and the complete antithesis of a curated resort. It didn’t matter that we weren’t staying on-mountain considering that we had guides to drive us to the ski areas and look after all the planning. Ryokan Biyu was a lovely spot to stay and provided Japanese experiences including the all-important onsen. We had a multi-course Japanese dinner one night which ticked all the boxes, and breakfasts were also spot on.

SKI AREAS
The guides picked good ski areas to match the snow conditions. Days after snowfall, they found untracked lines at Shiga that only required a fossick in and a short push out, and lines at Togakushi that required no work to get in or out. And on a powder day at Shiga, Jase took us to tree lines that were untracked all day and the runs kept getting better and better each time.

GUIDING
The guiding has changed remarkably over the past 7 years. We had a couple of different guides and there was a lot of emphasis on avalanche safety, reminders about tree buddies, appropriate regrouping, and other strategies to ensure we were all accounted for. Instructions were clear and we felt like we always knew the plan.

It was advantageous that there were multiple groups, so the guides had flexibility to change the groups a little each day, depending on how people were feeling or if someone had overstated their ability level.

The tour was well suited to those who could pack a sense of humour and not take things too seriously, because Jase has a whacky and infectious sense of humour. However when he was guiding, he was all business and there was a good balance between fun and seriousness. Our other guide also had the right equilibrium.

OTHER EXPERIENCES
This tour was so much more than just skiing powder. On the way home from skiing, little excursions were included. On nights when dinner wasn’t organised such as the sushi train restaurant or the Biyu feast, the guides provided recommendations for dining in Yudanaka.
Other additions were a geisha performance and fun karaoke night – just don’t pick a song that one of the guides doesn’t like!
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We have skied in Japan a number of times and as it gets busier and busier, were looking for something different. We dropped into Jase's Powder tour for three days skiing and were not disappointed. I loved skiing in some less well known resorts and loved the girls in my ski group. My husband and daughter were very spoilt and had some fabulous powder skiing - Jase knows those mountains!! - but importantly I felt all our different abilities and objectives were considered - no mean feat in group situations. Well done Japan Powder Tours.
I should add that the schedule was reasonably full on - no moss growing under anyone's feet - but you could dip in and out of the activities. Yudanaka was fun - great food, far fewer westerners than in Nozawa etc. It was a perfect add on to our trip! Arigato gozaimashta Jase :)
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There were some very good and also some eye-openingly unprofessional aspects of this trip and the staff of JPCT. I'll start with the good:

- Shiga Kogen is a great mountain. It's the only place we skied (we took a cultural exploration day when the group went to Myoko), but it's big enough to encompass multiple regular-sized Japanese resorts. 50 chairlifts, tons of aspects, multiple peaks, all kinds of terrain. We found pow every day. We mostly skied with Jase, and he really knows his way around the area. We got into some stashes that looked like they hadn't been touched for days...not that you have to do that; we also skied untracked pow right under a gondola at 2pm.

- Skiing out of bounds felt safe enough, and the guides definitely had their eye on where we were going with knowledge of the recent snowfall, accumulation behavior, and different aspects of the mountain. I never felt unsafe about the terrain (and in general, Shiga is very skiable for most ability levels).

- The non-skiing cultural stuff was great too. Snow monkeys, local artisans, the geisha and martial arts performances, lovely towns with great shops, restaurants, museums, and beautiful shrines everywhere. All very affordable, much like the rest of Japan.

- The hotel has a public onsen in the basement and a private one on the roof. So relaxing.

- Breakfast is included. It's the same every day, so it got old, but the quality is good. Not the best food we had in Japan.

- Communication is very robust and everything is on time and smooth. We received plenty of information about travel from Tokyo to Yudanaka and also info - some useful, some less so - about navigating Japan in general. There were WhatsApp threads for organizing the groups and ski days, getting back together if people got separated, and sharing photos and videos.

- The other folks who were there for various JPCT tours were great!

Ok, now for the not great:

- DO NOT rent or borrow equipment from these guys. A woman on our trip was using one of their loaner skis and the heel piece of one of the bindings was literally falling off, like screws ripped out of the ski. How did they not notice that before giving her the skis? The answer is that they obviously did nothing resembling a safety check or release test. The danger was compounded when Jase said "just ski down gently to the base on the groomers, it'll be fine" in a very condescending tone. I regret not putting my foot down and calling out this egregious lack of customer concern and the blatant disregard for safety, combined with a flippant attitude towards someone who was coming off a major injury (unrelated to this trip). As a former ski coach and shop tech, I've seen firsthand that this is the kind of thing that can result in catastrophe, so my disinclination to make waves on the first day is on me. Luckily, nothing happened and everyone was ok. But, Jase was very arrogant about it (and most things, in general) and took no responsibility for the situation until later - and even then, begrudgingly - even trying to blame the woman whose life he put at risk after being called out by multiple people, including one of his own guides.

- The bus rides up to the mountain were...interesting. "Story time" didn't happen every day, but when it did it mostly consisted of crass, misogynistic, and just flat out made up B.S. It was insulting.

- There was general misogyny and disrespect for the women on our trip; every story Jase had to tell about women involved the "wife of the devil" or prostitutes. In general, the women were not talked to with respect or treated like equals, for example giving pet names to a woman less than half your age (this was not Jase but another of the guides). General arrogance and chauvinism was our experience with other male guides from "down under" as well. Again, it's probably not everyone, but is the case with some of the guides at JPCT, including the owner of the outfit.

- THERE IS A DIFFERENCE BETWEEN A SKI GUIDE AND A "TOUR GUIDE." This is a Japan thing in general, so be VERY diligent about checking to see whether your guides have actual certification - wilderness first aid? Avalanche safety certs? - or if they’re just ski bums who know their way around the mountain. I don't know if Jase is certified; I know that most of the other guides are not. This information should be made available on Powderhounds, but since it isn’t, you have to do some digging on your own.

- Related: There was no check to determine whether people knew how to use their avy gear. The “guides” just checked to make sure beacons were on. Additionally, the practice - not necessarily ubiquitous in Japan, but it was our experience with Jase and others - of having each person stop above the group is beyond unsafe. While we were on Hokkaido for another part of our trip, several skiers died in an avalanche near Nagano precisely because someone stopped above them and triggered the slide (this was not a JPCT trip, I’m just illustrating a point). I understand the need to not ski ahead of the guide for safety reasons, however stopping above the group is just begging for trouble. This is Ski Group Safety 101 - always stop below (or in this case, more likely parallel to) the group.

In conclusion:

The skiing itself with Japan Powder Culture Tours was very good. Even early in our trip with little immediate recent snowfall, Shiga Kogen is such that there were abundant powder stashes to be found. When the flakes did start flying towards the middle and end of our stay, we had some of our best days in Japan; the “on-piste” culture of Japanese skiing meant that we skied untracked pow with free refills from bell to bell. The guides, especially Jase, really know their way around the mountain.

The human element of the offering from JPCT was a very mixed bag. The other people on our tour were wonderful, diverse, engaging, and a blast to ski, explore, and hang out with. The accommodations were fine, service at the hotel was excellent. Yudanaka and the surrounding area were charming - especially the town of Obuse - with abundant delicious food and cultural engagement available everywhere. However, most of that is Japan in general and is undoubtedly available with other tour companies. With JPCT, the misogyny, arrogance, and condescension that we experienced from Jase and others, the lack of guiding experience/certification on the staff, the selective attention to safety, the B.S., and the lack of self-responsibility from Jase was more than enough for me to look elsewhere on my next trip.
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