The people of Niseko, Kutchan and surrounding area rallied together on the snow with a charity ride and auction to raise funds for the Tohoku tsunami relief fund and Red Cross Japan yesterday. Local legends, companies, ambassadors and professional riders all donated their time and gear to this great cause and event that has been touring from resort to resort around Hokkaido the past couple weeks.

From Grand Hirafu's opening day, our Holiday Niseko accommodation has been booked out with great people from all over the world this 2010/2011 season. January and February's powder dumped through early March and the snow depth was all time! Stoke and hype was full power. Families and friendly groups of skiers and snowboarder's were having a blast on their holidays- telling us that the snow has been some of the best they had ever skied or slashed, until March 11th.

Hokkaido winter has more snow to pile-up on our already packed-out 4+meter snowbase! It's the perfect time to be here or hook a deal and book last minute accommodation.

Along with setting you up with accommodation and ski packages, Holiday Niseko can also help in arranging a rental vehicle during your Niseko winter holiday. If you like the freedom of having your own wheels and enjoy exploring parts unknown, the roads around Niseko are ready for you to roll. All you need is an international drivers license permit from your home country and your set.

Onegiri or rice ball..? I call them sushi-triangles and they save starving snowboarder's lives! Those of you that are now in Niseko skiing or have been here already know... but for the future Niseko explorer, here is a tip on eating decent when taking a break from the snowy slopes without breaking your wallet.

It's been a snowy 2010/2011 winter season so far for everybody at Holiday Niseko and our guests staying in our accommodation. Snowboarding and skiing the inbounds powder on Niseko's slopes has been awesome awesome awesome. Going on day tours, dropping lines in Hokkaido's national park backcountry and riding the Hanazono park has been epic as well.

Antti Autti and crew have been up in Niseko on holiday this past week ripping the powder and filming for the "Antiout" movie. Antti snowboards here every year with his Finnish crew and hits up the Sapporo big air in the end of February. Enjoy this clip of this past week! Holiday Niseko ¨Antiout Movie¨ - Hokkaido powder heaven from Anttisworld on Vimeo. ¨Antiout Movie¨- Niseko Powder Peek from Anttisworld on Vimeo.

A few of us from the Holiday Nisekoteam made the journey to Sapporo for the 62nd snow festival. We jumped in the car withNisekoSnow-Simonand made our way through the mountains and along the coast via hwy 5 to the city center of Sapporo. Parked the car, enjoyed some sushi train and hit the main festival site mid-afternoon. Starting at Odori park, we slowly walked through the 140 snow and ice sculpted statues and temples in complete awe. The impre

It's very forward thinking for Niseko Village (Higashiyama) resort to educate and promote avalanche safety on a zone and it's dangers, snowpack and terrain traps before allowing access to shredding it. Other resorts around the world should follow in their boot-steps. The steep and deep Mizuno-no-Sawa area is controlled and patrolled, but does not keep you out of powder covered crevasses or self sluff-slide trouble. Having some basic avalanche s

With all the powder we have had fun skiing and snowboarding in, there also comes a lot of work to deal with it. The Niseko Grand Hirafu city snow removal crew has been working 24/7 to keep up with the snow this season. Our Holiday Niseko team has been putting in a ton of shoveling as well. With dangerous roof slides constantly filling in our walk-ways, we are always on alert and looking up as we clear snow. There were even days last week when we