There aren’t too many Japanese ski resorts left that have nice snow quality, great easy to find lift-accessed tree skiing, and barely anyone to compete with for the fresh snow. These are defined as unicorn ski resorts and Oze Iwakura is one of them – a powder hound gem. So why not just keep the secret to ourselves? Firstly the Katashina area really looks like it could use your tourist dollar (or yen) and most Japanese visitors are just day trippers on weekends. We’ve seen too many off-the-beaten-track Japanese ski resorts close down or at least shut down some of the lifts. On the face of it, Oze Iwakura looks financially successful when you see the weekend crowds hanging around the base, but even they couldn’t afford to fix the #4 chair lift and it’s now defunct, and there are other archaic lifts that will need some significant investment.

We re-visited Oze Iwakura on a Saturday with about 30cm of fresh snow sitting on top of crust. There were several more people riding off-piste compared to the last time we visited (last time it was just the 2 of us). We still managed to get fresh lines all day, although we had to fossick a little harder for it because it was a lean snow season and there was a lot of shrubbery. Ski patrol have now twigged that people will potentially head off-piste and they’ve added a few signs in English warning about avalanche risk in one area. Speaking of sliding snow, by the afternoon we called it quits after doing very steep lines between #9 and #11 trails, and getting the jitters from the lack of snow stability.

Oze Iwakura is our favourite of the Katashina ski resorts because it’s got the best off-piste terrain, but it’s worth sampling a couple of the others too such as Oze Tokura where we had plenty of off-piste fun. The region is lovely and an opportunity to hang out in the genuine Japan. At so many Japanese ski areas now you can speak English wherever you go, have a western breakfast, and sleep on a comfie western bed. It was refreshing to visit Katashina for an old-school Japanese ski trip experience.

You can see our thoughts on the pros and cons on the Oze Iwakura overview page how we rated Oze Iwakura against other ski resorts on the Japan ski resort ratings.
See our video here

Oze Iwakura stood out as the best surprise package for off-piste powder skiing on our last recon trip to Japan. Oze Iwakura is a traditional Japanese ski resort in a few respects. It was a Sunday and the front face of the ski resort was teeming with snowboarders and there was a big line to the gondola in the morning. Meanwhile there was barely anyone in the Nishiyama area except for some skiers smashing their knees on the steep moguls, and absolutely no one was riding off-piste.

The off-piste and sidecountry terrain was amazing. You didn’t have to be Einstein to find it or get back to the piste, and it was easy enough to do it without being in view of folks on the lifts. The tree skiing was very varied across lots of different aspects, but of course the best part was that it belonged to only us.

The snow quality was a major surprise. A few days prior the temps had warmed up across Honshu and the skiing at other Gunma ski resorts was not ideal, so we thought the snow would be complete rubbish. Thankfully it had snowed overnight, and it was very dry blower powder although you could feel the crust underneath at times. If you have one of those T-shirts “I Love Big Dumps” then you might not love Oze Iwakura relative to other Honshu ski resorts because it doesn’t receive monumental amounts of snow, but the snow quality was much better than what you’d find closer to the coast.

We stayed at a simple hotel near the base of Oze Tokura. It was far from flash but it was really enjoyable because no one spoke English and we knew we’d really gotten off the beaten track of ski resorts. We headed into Katashina one night for dinner (which looks like it needs your tourist dollars) and that too was an amazing experience of the true Japan.

You can see our thoughts on the pros and cons on the Oze Iwakura overview page how we rated Oze Iwakura against other ski resorts on the Japan ski resort ratings.
See our video here