I’m taking the Toki ✌️✌️ shinkansen towards Jomo-Kogen, then getting a rental car to drive the rest of the way to Oze. There should be some good hiking around there, but… well I haven’t gotten this fully planned out yet. But I’m prepared! And I think I can find a cabin to stay at in the national park. I’ll figure it out when I get there.

The shinkansen is quick as always, and the drive is easy. More accurately, the driving is easy but I have no idea whereTF I am. I’m a little out-of-season for the usual touristy stuff, so a lot of things aren’t open yet for the summer, and all the snow recreation areas are closed. This makes things… tricky.

It’s about 3pm when I get to Snow Park Oze Tokura and resign myself to the fact that I won’t be hiking into the national park today. I haven’t even found a place to park and enter the area, let alone arrange a place to bunk for the night. You’d think it’s not that hard, but all the tourist maps of the area are pictorial ones that only identify landmarks, and they don’t align clearly with google maps so it’s hard to know where you’re really aiming for.

I pick a spot and aim for it; there’s another snow resort about 20min drive away, and a bunch of lodges there – surely one of them will be open. I take the opportunity to give the rented Toyota a solid thrashing along the windy mountain roads.

It’s been a little while since the last trip and I assure you, dear reader, that my Japanese has only gotten worse. There’s one guy tending the garden when I roll up outside Pension Pokapoka, and he’s thoroughly confused.

Excuse me~! Do you have any vacancies?
Sorry?
Do you have any vacancies?
Ah please come in. Do you have a reservation?
Uhhhhh no.
[ some time later ]
So… you want to stay one night? One person?
Yes.
[ there are some paper forms to fill out and passport to present, and 14500yen to pay when I check out ]

I don’t think they’ve had any guests for ages – I mean who would come out to the snowfields when there’s no snow??

Anyway this is great, it’s cosy and dark and I have a whole 3-person room to myself. The floor is tatami mats and all the furniture is a lovely dark wood. Dinner is tasty, and I settle in for a fitful sleep.