Just a slight dusting of snow to report. Very fine snow started falling from early morning and we are expecting (and very much hoping) for snow to be falling through the day today.

This morning it has started getting colder and temperatures are forecast to drop further tonight and then some decent snowfall is expected tomorrow. A return to winter?

The rain yesterday did no favours to the snow conditions so a little hard this morning.

The roads around the area are icy and slippery this morning - take careful!

Just some information on nearby resorts:

The three ski resorts in Ura Bandai (Grandeco, Nekoma, Ura Bandai) are all open. The areas to the south of Mt Bandai (Inawashiro and Bantai town) are not having it as good... Inawashiro & Minero ski areas will be closed between 4-8 Jan and Inawashiro Resort ski area closed from today. Alts Bandai ski remains open but there is just 10cm snow depth at the base and you need to take lifts to get up to No.4 lift.

This is not what we all expect for the time of the year, and everyone is hoping for a big change soon.

The forecast is good for snow over the coming week. Fingers crossed.

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Lifts operating:

Gondola
Number 1 quad
Number 2 quad
Number 3 quad

Courses open:

(A-a) Rainbow 3500
(A-b) Rainbow 3500
(A-c) Rainbow 3500
(B-a) Mint
(B-c) Mint
(C) Center
(D-b) Lavender
(F) Basil

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Snow and weather forecast:

6 day snow and weather forecast for Grandeco

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Welcome to our new ‘Grandeco Now' reports, exclusive to SnowJapan.

As with all our Now daily reports, it extremely important to us that the information we publish is useful, honest and correct and we’ll be doing everything we can to bring you some good info from this region. Grandeco is located in Kita Shiobara village in the north western region of Fukushima Prefecture - we are very pleased to be able to begin reporting from this region of Japan. More information on Grandeco can be found here and a Resort Spotlight on SnowJapan here.