Ski touring in Hakkoda Mountains

The Hakkōda mountains in Aomori catch some of the heaviest snowfall anywhere on earth, and one strange consequence is the juhyō — the 'snow monsters', fir trees so encased in wind-driven rime that they stand across the slopes like a silent crowd of white figures in the fog. You tour between them, and in cloud the effect is genuinely eerie.

A guide here is not a luxury but standard practice, because the terrain turns featureless in a whiteout and navigation becomes the real hazard. This is the range where an army unit of nearly two hundred men died in a blizzard in 1902, and the mountain has not softened since. The reward for the seriousness is deep, cold powder and, at the end of the day, the famously sulphurous baths of Sukayu Onsen.

Go in the depth of winter, January to March. Carry avalanche gear, keep a guide close, and let the whiteout — not your legs — decide how far the day goes.

Navigation in whiteout is the real hazard here. Local guides are standard practice, not a luxury.