三雪場開箱！免費纜車＋星野飯店＋神樂春滑超省攻略

三雪場開箱！免費纜車＋星野飯店＋神樂春滑超省攻略

With winter fast approaching, are you all starting to plan your ski trips to Japan? In this episode, we’ll review the three ski resorts we visited during the 2025 ski season. The first two are Inawashiro Ski Resort in Fukushima Prefecture, and Hoshino Resorts Alts Bandai. The third is Kagura Ski Resort in Echigo-Yuzawa. We’ll also review the accommodation this time: Hoshino Resorts Bandaisan Onsen Hotel, and a very affordable, whole-cabin rental in the snow. I’ll share the related costs with you all, so make sure you watch until the end! First up is Inawashiro Ski Resort. This resort is located at the foot of Mount Bandai in Fukushima Prefecture, and offers views of Lake Inawashiro, Japan’s fourth-largest lake. The biggest feature of this resort is that it offers free weekday lift passes. A one-day lift ticket usually costs over 5,000 yen, so visiting this resort can save you a lot of money! Inawashiro Ski Resort is very large, with three main areas. The right side is the Minero Area. The Green runs here are relatively steep and narrow. When I skied them, I honestly felt they were a bit too difficult for beginners. I fell several times, and at one point thought I wouldn’t make it down. The upper left is the Sky Area. The elevation here is higher, so the snow quality is better. The slope is also moderate. I think it’s suitable for intermediate skiers and above. The lower left is the Base Area. The slopes here are flat and wide. Especially runs 15 to 18, the average gradient is only 10 to 11 degrees. The widest part is up to 200 meters wide, making it very suitable for beginners to practice here. As beginners, we practiced here for a whole day. Let’s see the results of our practice! This resort has many other features, including free shuttle buses from major JR stations. This type of long-distance bus usually costs around 3,000 yen in Japan, but this resort offers free shuttle service. That’s incredibly generous! They also have a service to record your skiing video for free. Simply scan your membership QR Code on their designated run, and multiple cameras will record your skiing video for you. Whether it’s a race course, a park, or jumps, they can record the video for you, and you can download it to your phone. The children’s play area is also free. Remember to pick up the free ticket for the kids’ area at the counter. Renting sleds, snow tubes, or snow bikes requires an extra fee. You can also rent clear dome pods at the resort. Here you can rest, enjoy the snow and lake views, and take great Instagram-worthy photos. In addition, fireworks are set off every Saturday and on the eve of Japanese national holidays. Watching a “Song of Ice and Fire” show must be quite special. Something else I highly recommend is the relatively inexpensive English instructor fee here. A 90-minute group lesson is 6,000 yen. English instructor fees at other resorts can be more than double this. If you want more information, I’ve put the link in the description box. Please check it out. The second resort we visited is Hoshino Resorts Nekoma Bandai. The biggest feature of this resort is that
it is said to be the largest ski resort in the Tohoku region, formed by the Hoshino Group integrating the southern Alts Bandai Ski Resort with the northern Nekoma Ski Resort into one massive ski resort. People who ski here can stay directly in the Hoshino Resort, enjoying the convenience of Ski In Ski Out. This is a corridor from the hotel that leads to the ski resort. Let’s go take a look at the resort side. Inside is the resort restaurant. It’s not open yet. Outside is the ski resort! Wow! This is Mount Bandai. This resort is truly enormous. We spent the entire day mostly skiing in the small Green run area on the south side. There is a free magic carpet short slope practice area here, which is great for beginners to practice. After practicing on the magic carpet, we can take the First Chair lift. There are two Green runs to ski down from the top. The first is the Zunai-2 run, which is about 700 meters long. Although most of it is a gentle and wide slope, you should be aware that the last 100 meters has a gradient of 19 degrees, almost Red run level. So if you want to avoid that steep section, you can switch to this traverse run halfway, called Panorama Line. The average gradient of this run is only 5 degrees, and the maximum slope is only 10 degrees. And it can be up to 2.5 kilometers long. For two-plankers (skiers), you can practically ski down the whole way leisurely without braking. It’s truly very comfortable for beginners. Oh, there’s a helicopter! Looks like someone might be injured. This is a four-person chairlift. It goes directly to the very top of the mountain. After finishing the two slopes at the foot of the mountain, I took the ALTS Express high-speed gondola, planning to ski down the Green run all the way from the summit. The scenery on the mountain top is definitely different. You can see the very beautiful Mount Bandai on the left. The snow quality on the mountain is also better than at the bottom, it’s powdery. However, the Green run here is steeper than the one at the bottom. I fell several times here. Also, the run here felt like skiing on a ridge. I didn’t dare to ski too close to the edge, afraid I might lose control and fall off the side. But thankfully, I still managed to ski down the mountain safely. I made it down. This time, I originally wanted to take this, which was just built in 2024: the lift connecting the north and south sides of the resort. It used to take an hour to drive from the south resort to the north resort. Now, taking this connecting lift only takes 7 minutes. If I have a chance to come back next time, I must take this lift to the Nekoma Ski Resort on the north side to experience their famous powder snow. Next, let’s review the accommodation. The room at Hoshino Resort is not particularly large; it’s the size of a typical upscale hotel room. The bathroom is also quite ordinary. Fortunately, the hotel provides a large onsen (hot spring) public bath, so the room’s bathroom wasn’t really used much. Our room type didn’t face the ski resort, so the view wasn’t particularly stunning. However, from the corner room, you could still see a part of Mount Bandai. As for the price, a double room for one night is 40,000 yen, including dinner and breakfast. I thought the meals were excellent. They offered many specialty dishes from the Aizu region. Especially for breakfast, they served a local dish called Hakozushi (Boxed Rice). It’s a dish where rice and ingredients are packed into a wooden container and steamed together. You can choose your favorite ingredients and create your own unique Hakozushi. Since this is a Ski In Ski Out hotel, the hotel also provides many skiing-related facilities, such as a ski lounge and a waxing room for snowboards. There’s also a beautifully designed ski and snowboard storage and drying room, and tools provided for children to play in the snow. Overall, the experience was truly comfortable. I recommend it to everyone. Next, I’m going to introduce another very affordable cabin rental to you all. Let me introduce this incredibly budget-friendly
standalone cabin accommodation I found. Renting the whole cabin for four people here is only 20,000 yen! Plus, there’s a supermarket nearby. You can go to the supermarket to buy ingredients and cook for yourselves. And the environment here is excellent. It’s located in the forest, with many of these standalone cabins. Doesn’t it look like a European vacation spot? And this one in front is the cabin we stayed in. It can accommodate a total of four people. Look, there’s even my name here. Very thoughtful. And the outdoor area here is set up with this table and chairs. You can have a BBQ here. Like this grill here, and they gave us this grill net. But because the weather is too cold now, we didn’t use it. Well, let’s go inside and take a look. Right upon entering, you see a staircase here. Upstairs is the sleeping area. And to the right is the living room, the shared area. It’s quite spacious, seating four people. To the right there’s a TV and a heater. It has everything you need: rice cooker, oven, microwave, and plenty of plates and bowls to use here. The kitchen area. Of course, it has a refrigerator, and also a gas stove. All kinds of pots, pans, and cutlery are available. However, they do not provide seasonings here, so you have to bring your own. Next to the refrigerator is the toilet. It’s also quite clean and tidy. Finally, here is the bathroom area. It includes a washing machine. There’s a wash basin, and a bathtub. And this bathtub even has a jacuzzi function. Next, let’s go upstairs and take a look. There are two rooms upstairs. The first one has two single beds. The owner provided plenty of bedding for us to use. And there is an attic space available here. It’s quite spacious up there. The other room is a Japanese-style room, which also has two beds set up. And you can book this accommodation on booking.com. It’s very convenient. The minimum occupancy for their cabins starts from 4 people. They also have 8-person and 12-person cabins of various sizes. To book, just search for Inawashiro-machi as the location on booking.com, and use the keyword “cottage all resort service”. You will find all sorts of cabins. Finally, everyone needs to take their garbage out and dispose of it here. There are bins for bottles and cans, combustibles, and paper. We spent the 2025 winter ski season at the foot of this beautiful Mount Bandai. But this year’s skiing trip wasn’t over yet. In April, during the spring, before heading from Tokyo to Tohoku for cherry blossom viewing, we, with itchy feet, picked another resort for spring skiing. This resort is Kagura Ski Resort in Niigata Prefecture. It’s a resort where you can ski until mid-to-late May. We came on April 19th, and you can see there is still a considerable amount of snow along the way. Getting here is very convenient. If you depart from Tokyo, it only takes 1 hour and 10 minutes by Shinkansen to reach Echigo-Yuzawa Station. Upon arrival, I recommend this shop called Boo Sport for equipment rental. Besides the good quality of their gear, they also sell discounted one-day lift tickets and offer a free shuttle service to the resort. Kagura Ski Resort, where we are going this time, is mainly divided into three areas: Tashiro Area, Kagura Area, and Mitsumata Area. The Mitsumata Area is the area where you can get a free shuttle from the rental shop. The ride takes about 15 minutes. After arriving, we’ll take this Mitsumata Gondola up to the resort. We mainly skied in the Mitsumata Area this time. Most of the runs here are Green. And the ones marked with a yellow background mean they are slow zones, very suitable for beginners. The area a bit higher up the mountain is called the Kagura Area. Most of the runs here are intermediate to advanced. Take a look at this large steep slope; isn’t it a bit scary? And there are many moguls for experts to challenge. Although we can’t ski the runs in the Kagura Area with our current ability, we can still take the gondola up to eat at a restaurant here called Wada Hut. Coming here to eat, rest, and enjoy the snow view from the mountain top is also very nice. I ordered what is said to be the signature dish here: Black Wagyu and Australian Steak Donburi. It contains two different preparations of beef, along with fresh vegetables and an onsen egg. It was delicious, but this bowl costs 4,000 yen. I think it’s a bit pricey. I probably won’t order it a second time. After eating, we skied down the E1 run. The scenery at the beginning of the E1 run is quite nice. You can see the distant mountains and the Iwahara Ski Resort on the other side. The run length is very long, reaching over 3 kilometers. It connects to the E2 run, where my arrow is pointing. Although the map says the steepest part of the E1 run is 26 degrees, it’s actually only a short section, and there is a gentle detour path for beginners to bypass it. So don’t worry too much. The overall average gradient is only 7 degrees, which is quite flat, very suitable for beginners. Most of the time, you can ski leisurely with straight boards, just like me. And one lift ride allows you to ski over 3 kilometers, making the practice efficiency very high. Another run we practiced on is the A1 run. This one is about 1 kilometer long, with an average gradient of only 10 degrees. The run is much wider than the E1 run. However, the slope at the end of the run is 18 degrees, which might be a bit steep for beginners. Fortunately, it’s not very long, and it’s a great run to practice adapting to steep slopes. Next, I want to talk about the benefits of spring skiing. Firstly, the weather is usually nice. With a high chance of clear skies, you get the chance to see beautiful scenery. In addition, the higher temperature means you don’t have to wear heavy ski gear. Look here, some people are even skiing in short sleeves. I only wore a GORE-TEX waterproof shell on the outside. With light gear, the whole skiing trip becomes very convenient. Speaking of snow quality, I think the spring snow is also quite suitable for beginners. Winter snow can sometimes turn into ice, making it too slippery and difficult to brake, and falling hurts. But spring snow is wet, sticky, and soft. Your board feels “stuck” and you can’t slide too fast. I think it’s very suitable for beginners to practice controlling speed and building confidence, and it doesn’t hurt when you fall. Furthermore, the prices are also much cheaper. Because it’s no longer peak season, the prices for accommodation, lift tickets, etc., will be lower. You also won’t encounter the frequent lift queues that happen during peak season. The drawback is if you want to find an instructor, it might be difficult to find any at this time. So if you don’t need an instructor and don’t pursue the romantic view of falling snow, why not take a different kind of spring ski trip during cherry blossom season? Finally, let’s look at the cost of the ski trip. For a budget traveler, how much does a 5-day trip with 3 days of skiing cost? We’ll use Inawashiro Ski Resort, introduced at the start of the video, paired with the whole-cabin rental as an example. We chose Tigerair’s direct flight to Fukushima, round-trip costing about NT$12,000. Renting a car split among four people is about NT$3,400 per person. Staying in the whole cabin for four nights is about NT$4,100 per person. The resort lift tickets are free. Renting equipment, jacket, and pants for three days costs about NT$4,400. For instructor fees, we chose a 90-minute instructor lesson each morning for the three skiing days, and practiced on our own in the afternoons. The instructor fee is about NT$3,700. Finally, adding about NT$4,000 for food and drinks over five days, the total cost will be around NT$32,000. If I compare it to a random travel agency’s ski tour, a 5-day tour costs about NT$60,000. My budget-friendly plan is nearly NT$30,000 cheaper than the travel agency’s. Of course, the travel agency’s food and accommodation might be better, and the lessons might be all-inclusive. You also don’t have to manage all the little details yourself. So my budget traveler plan is just for your reference! That concludes this ski trip video. If you found it useful, please hit like and share it. There will be other videos about Fukushima winter travel coming up, and a complete guide to viewing cherry blossoms at the Three Great Spots of Tohoku. If you don’t want to miss them, remember to subscribe to ‘Live Frugally’, and let’s travel smart together. See you next time, bye bye.

這一集要帶大家開箱我在 2025 年雪季玩到的三個超棒雪場：
🏔 福島縣的 豬苗代滑雪場（平日纜車券免費！）
🎿 星野磐梯山滑雪場（星野集團打造的超大滑雪度假村）
❄️ 新潟縣的 神樂滑雪場（4 月還能滑雪的春季雪場）

還有兩種住宿開箱：
🏠 星野集團磐梯山溫泉飯店（Ski in Ski out）
🌲 超划算的森林小木屋住宿（4 人包棟只要 2 萬日圓）

最後也會分享小資族滑雪五日行的費用試算，
比旅行社整整便宜 3 萬！
想知道怎麼玩最划算、哪裡最適合新手滑雪，這集千萬別錯過！

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豬苗代滑雪場（Inawashiro Ski Resort）
[官網連結]https://www.inawashiro-ski.com/?season=snow

加入會員拿免費纜車票
https://fanclub.inawashiro-ski.com/fanclub/login.bean

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💰 小資滑雪五日行費用參考（每人）
• 機票：NT$12,000（虎航直飛福島）
• 租車：NT$3,400（四人分攤）
• 小木屋住宿四晚：NT$4,100
• 租雪具與雪衣褲三天：NT$4,400
• 教練課三天：NT$3,700
• 餐飲花費：約 NT$4,000
🧾 總花費：約 NT$32,000（比團體滑雪省近 3 萬元！）

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🎥 更多旅遊影片

👉 [福島冬日旅行特輯（即將上線）]
👉 [東北櫻花賞攻略系列（即將上線）]