Hakuba Now: Saturday 5th December 2020
- Dec 5, 2020
- 3 min read
Independent snow and weather reporting from the Hakuba region of Nagano
New snowfall at base 0cm
Snowfall at base this season 0cm
Posted on Saturday 5th December 2020 This is an archived report. The latest Hakuba Now report can be found here.
It has been a few days since my last report so I thought I would post an update.
Not a whole lot of news as we wait for snowfall.
This morning it is sunny and a mild weekend is forecast with temperatures of around 9-10C due in the village both today and tomorrow.
It should be getting colder again come late Monday and into Tuesday with a chance of some more snow on the mountains.
I hope you have a good weekend and I'll be back in the coming week.
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So yes, 2020. What a year!
The winter season was... well, on the mild side... and then the annoying coronavirus started to cause problems in the second part of the season, eventually bringing the season to an early end.
It has been a challenging year for pretty much everyone; and for some more than others. Hakuba is of course a year round tourist destination and it has been a tough year for many related businesses. The Japanese government 'Go To' travel campaign seems to have been welcomed and has brought some people back over the last few months. That has apparently brought some relief, which is of course good to hear.
How the coming winter season pans out remains to be seen.
Many of you reading this from outside of Japan were probably planning to come to Hakuba this winter, but will not be able to. Unfortunately, I can't say much that will make you feel any better about that. But I have no doubt that even if you are not able to be here this winter, you'll be interested to see how this season goes and be looking forward to the time when you can be here... hopefully in the not too distant future.
For various beyond-our-control circumstance reasons, there very nearly wasn't going to be a Hakuba Now report this season. But I am happy to report that we have overcome those things and plan to keep Hakuba Now updated through the 2020-2021 season. Yey!
Before we get going properly, there are just a few important things that I would like to mention:
** The Hakuba Now reports may appear later in the day than they have done in the past
** However, we plan to 'time-stamp' them as the time the main information was written; this is so as to not cause confusion
** If Hakuba Valley update their official site with snowfall numbers, we will report those - like we did last year
We are going to have to see how it all goes; some unknowns remain as we ourselves are dealing with changed circumstances.
Whatever: the concept behind these reports remains unchanged. (Of course!)
It was hoped that some ski lifts might be moving by the end of November and Hakuba Happo-one was hoping to start up in some fashion from today, but no lifts are able to open yet.
There is snow on the upper areas right now. I see Hakuba 47 were reporting 10cm at 1,450m from Saturday. You can get an idea from images below (from Happo-one, Tsugaike and Cortina).
There doesn't seem to be much snow on the forecast in the coming few days and right now there is a lot of blue sky and just a slight breeze.
Once the lifts start moving I plan to be with you every day.
Hakuba Now 2020-2021 season |
Data as of Saturday 5th December 2020 Total snowfall at base so far 0cm Number of days snowfall observed at base 0 days Most snowfall observed in 1 day 0cm November 2020 snowfall 0cm December 2020 snowfall 0cm |
All snowfall data presented on this page is the snowfall measured and observed at base/town level by our reporter based in Hakuba. The 'new snowfall' number represents the amount of snow measured since the previous report. All opinions are those of the individual reporters. Information regarding ski area operations is manually checked every morning and is believed to be correct at the time of the report.