Just back from a week's holiday and have returned to real Spring in the mountains. At noon yesterday it hit 17C down in the village and heard stories from mountaineers of massive avalanches rolling down the backside of Mount Tanigawa.

Today sees more of the same with bright blue skies and warm temps early on.

Hodaigi is still running three lifts which include the 1km long beginner piste and the quad chair to the top of the resort however they will close for the season on Monday, as Okutone also plan to do (after extending their season until Sunday 9th).

That will leave Tenjin as the only show in town. The base up top is still 4.6m and this weekend will see the resort host the Minakami Vibes festival with work nearly complete on their goal of producing "The biggest bowl in the World". They may not attain this lofty ambition but it does appear as though it will be the biggest bowl ever for Tenjin and we have had big ones in the past.

Once the event is through the bowl usually stays well maintained for about a week but they will go into park production mode from Monday. This ought to keep things interesting as the melt gradually progresses.

On the forecast is big rain tonight and from tomorrow it looks like a roll of the dice. The mountain forecast is for light rain or rain showers over the weekend but the town forecast looks far better so who knows which weather pattern will prevail. The weekend forecast though has improved from yesterday when all out rain was on the menu.

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Fresh snowfall:

0cm Tenjin

Temps at 8am

Official snow depth:

460cm Tenjin
170cm Hodaigi
110cm Okutone

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*** Please note that the fresh snowfall number being reported on this report is taken from the ‘base area’ of Tenjindaira - which is just by the top station of the Ropeway at that resort. Other snowfall numbers and commentary will be mentioned within each report when available.