There was negligible information or reviews about the snow or terrain at Hinata, so we took a punt in visiting this little low elevation ski area. Whilst we’ve visited various tiny Japanese ski areas that have been a fail, Hinata was a delightful surprise package.

We like to try and support little Japanese ski areas as so many are teetering on the brink of existence, yet we were almost embarrassed because on the Saturday that we visited, lift passes were free, as part of the town’s celebration of an Austrian who brought skiing to the area.

It had snowed a moderate amount the night before and we turned up at lunch time. There were plenty of families having fun on-piste but not enough to create a lift line at all. There were various tracks in the open off-piste zone to skiers’ right of the single chair, otherwise there were no tracks. The snow wasn’t particularly deep but it was cold and the snow quality was very nice. We mostly played in the sidecountry which had some good pitch at the top, and had zero competition for the powder. The day was perfectly topped off with a soak in the onsen.

You can see how we rated Hinata on various factors on the Hokkaido ski resort ratings.
See our video here