Yuzawa Now: Friday 18th May 2018
- May 18, 2018
- 3 min read
Updated: Nov 25, 2025
Independent snow and weather reporting from the Yuzawa & Minamiuonuma region of Niigata
New snowfall at base 0cm
Snowfall at base this season 857cm
Posted on Friday 18th May 2018 This is an archived report. The latest Yuzawa Now report can be found here.
Good morning from Yuzawa.
Yesterday and the day before were both pretty hot - it was almost 30C in Yuzawa on Wednesday!
And it's rather warm today too with temps up to about 27 (and possibly the rest) with something of humid feel out there.
Still, rain is due from sometime this afternoon and overnight tonight, possibly very heavy at times.
A dramatic cool-down is due tomorrow too... perhaps even down to around 10C in town during the day and even lower still later on. It looks like there's even the chance of some snow falling very high up (!), according to some forecasts.
So the weather is all over the place at the moment and something of a roller coaster ride.
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The 1500m main course at the Kagura ski resort remains open for this weekend. There's more ground appearing in places but still fairly decent snow on there, though rather 'dirty looking'. (See the image below from yesterday and courtesy of Kagura).
You need to get Mitsumata Ropeway, the Mitsumata quad and then the Kagura Gondola to get over to the main Kagura area. Once there, the Kagura Number 1 high speed lift and the Kagura Number 1 Romance lift plan to be operating and servicing the open course.
On the way back at the end of the day, you need to get the Kagura Gondola and then the Mitsumata Number 2 Romance lift. And then either take the Mitsumata quad back down to the Ropeway or slide down the artificial 'snow mats'.
If you want to avoid using the snow mats, there's some walking involved - a total of about 900m on the way over to Kagura and about 400m on the way back to Mitsumata Ropeway.
Mitsumata Ropeway plans to open at 7:30am on both Saturday and Sunday and operations will likely be back to how they are today on weekdays from Monday.
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Kagura is still hoping to be able to remain open until Sunday 27th May.
Yuzawa Now 2017-2018 season |
Data as of Friday 18th May 2018 Total snowfall at base so far 857cm Number of days snowfall observed at base 57 days Most snowfall observed in 1 day 60cm (26th January) November 2017 snowfall 14cm reported on 3 days December 2017 snowfall 277cm reported on 16 days January 2018 snowfall 392cm reported on 19 days February 2018 snowfall 162cm reported on 15 days March 2018 snowfall 11cm reported on 3 days April 2018 snowfall 1cm reported on 1 day May 2018 snowfall 0cm |
All snowfall data presented on this page is the snowfall measured and observed at base/town level by our reporter based in Yuzawa. 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.