Japan

With a 100-year ski history and a reputation for deep, deep snow, Japan has long occupied the dreams of skiers worldwide. KC Deane, Duncan Adams, Zack Giffin, Adam Ü, Grant Gunderson and Ian Fohrman chase a Japanese fantasy into the deep days of January on Mt. Myoko.

…Uniformed men, obscured and oddly distorted by the heat rising from embers, poked and prodded the luminescent coals. They were the custodians of a towering fire celebrating a century of sliding on snow in the land of the rising sun.

Nearby, children slid, rolled, tumbled and dove down a short steep snow covered slope while parents looked on. Men in white kimonos tended huge vats of free sake and a grill covered in skewered garlic calamari and baby octopi. A mascot named Reruhi-san, a caricature of a European man with a huge mustache, posed with small children as parents snapped photos. And, as it had since we arrived in this land, the sky pumped out huge white flakes…

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