Our recent visit to Tomamu cemented its many strengths. It’s great for non-skiers, curated resort activities, Instagram posers, and beginners, and it remains very family friendly. Nearly all the guests at the resort hotels were international Asians who were beginners or not there to ski or snowboard. It was easy to see that Tomamu was catering incredibly well to their needs.

What has become less clear for us is whether Tomamu is still a great ski resort for powder hounds as a destination resort. It’s still good for a day trip from Furano when it’s not windy and it looks like the lifts are running, but making a commitment to a multi-day stay at Tomamu became more dubious in the 2024 season. It seems that whilst a lot of investment has gone into all the extra-curricular activities and frills at Tomamu, the fundamentals of lift operations may not have been a priority. Via reports on our Japan Powder Hounds Forum on Facebook and looking at the resort’s website, it seemed that the Powder Chair (ie the lift that’s pretty crucial to sidecountry terrain, some of the off-piste, and efficient laps of the steeper terrain) was not operational for 3 weeks in January because it was awaiting a part to be sent! Other reports via the forum were that the gondola was closed a lot, sometimes due to wind, and other times due to maintenance problems.

During our stay in January, the Powder Chair was not operational. We had skins so this didn’t preclude us from heading over the back where the snow quality was good, but it was not an efficient way to get powder laps in. We played in the backcountry on the frontside, but this was the wrong aspect for the conditions. One day the gondola wasn’t operating due to maintenance issues, and queues for the Tomamu Express quad were long, so we bailed.

The lift operations were a major shortcoming. We say this with great trepidation considering that we love Tomamu. Many years ago, back when off-piste skiing was banned, the owner of the resort saw us doing sneaky runs in the backcountry. He took us on a tour of the backcountry to show us the full potential of the ski area, and then sought our help to market the resort. That was the beginnings of the Powderhounds.com website. We’ll continue to hold a special spot in our hearts for Tomamu and hope that lift operations for the 2025 season are better, and that the resort has plans afoot to replace the ancient gondola.

Other parts of our stay at Tomamu were very good. The restaurant offerings were varied and of high quality, staff interactions were good, and we also enjoyed the quintessential pretty drink at the ice bar. We stayed at the Tomamu Tower (you can see our review here) and whilst it’s not as glam as the Risonare, it provided a very convenient stay, plenty of space, and great views across the slopes.

You can see how we rated Tomamu versus other ski areas on our Hokkaido ski resort ratings.
See our video here

I've been fortunate to visit Tomamu on 4 occasions; three times with mates and once with my family. It was also my families first ever overseas snow trip and they loved it. There's a reason I keep coming back!
Tomamu has a few different ski in/out options, The Risonare, The Towers and Club Med. All provide excellent accommodation options for a variety of price ranges, although unfortunately even the cheeper Tower option has greatly increased in price over the past few seasons and might be beyond affordable for many powder chasers.
Tomamu is divided into 2 main areas, the Tomamu Mountain and the Tower Mountain sides. The runs on the Tower Mountain side are a little more family and beginner focused, although as with many Japanese resorts, the runs at the lower elevations tend to mellow out and it's really only at the top of either side that there is anything steep enough to challenge advanced riders.
But it's not steep terrain that brings powder hunters to Tomamu, it's the incredibly fun and well spaced tree zones that give this resort it's awesome factor! There are vast tree areas straight off the lifts, particularly on the Tomamu Mountain side, and with a 10 minute walk (still within resort boundaries) you can access fresh powder stashes and more tree runs on the ridge lines of both mountains. The Tower Mountain side actually has the remnants of some older runs that are no longer accessible via lift, but if you walk a couple of hundred meters from the Tower Express lift, you have your choice of three ungroomed long runs that will bring you right back to the base, hopefully with a face full of fresh snow.
Tomamu provided daily lessons, which both of my youngest kids and my wife used each day as they first learnt to ski and snowboard. Hire gear was also readily available. Each of my Tomamu visits have been in February and lift lines have been negligible.
Tomamu is conveniently accessed by direct resort bus transfer from New Chitose airport (about 90 mins), or if you know your way around you can use local trains from Sapporo or other parts of Hokkaido.
Being the location of our first ever overseas family snow holiday, Tomamu will always have a special place in my family's heart, but it's the super dry snow and tree runs that keep on bringing me back.
See our video here

Whilst many Japanese ski resorts are progressively becoming more antiquated and run-down, Tomamu is a modern resort. It’s a fancy resort with an abundance of amenities and activities that makes it attractive for families in particular. For us adults sans kids, it was very curated without being super kitsch like Rusutsu Resort Hotel. There were many impressive facets of the resort and the niceties were welcomed.

Our time at Tomamu served up some of the best powder skiing of our Japan road trip. It was blizzardy for much of the time and the temperatures were really cold so the snow quality was sublime. In the off-piste open areas, the snow tracked out reasonably quickly, yet in tighter areas and in the sidecountry we scored line after line of lift-accessed freshies, and because we were greedy we also put in a little bit of work to get more fresh powder. When the storm cleared one day, a few more powder hunters were out exploring but there was still plenty of powder to go around.

We stayed at the Risonare which is the premier suite hotel at Tomamu, with its incredibly spacious living area and a bathroom that was rather grandiose with its own corner jacuzzi and sauna.
We loved it (luckily there was powder to lure us out) and you can see our review here.

There were plenty of restaurants to choose from. We dined at the Nininupuru restaurant a couple of times. Despite the many people there, the illuminated views across the snowy trees made for a nice atmosphere. There was a massive choice of fare on offer, but it was still nice to vary it up elsewhere. Hotalu Street has been a nice addition in recent years, with its smaller, more affordable restaurants. We enjoyed the ramen restaurant, and Top Dog even made the big call that it was the best ramen he’s ever had!

We rate Tomamu as the #1 family ski resort in Japan, and this trip cemented this. Mina Mina Beach at the OTT wave pool was going off with lots of families having a ball. We also visited the ice village, and whilst we could see the attraction for kids, to us it felt like lots of ice domes that were basically just touristy shops selling gifts, or the ice bar with its expensive colourful drinks that look good on Instaglam. It wasn’t our cup of tea but thankfully there are plenty of other attractions at Tomamu that we found really impressive. Tomamu has a lot of pros, which we’ve outlined on the Tomamu overview page.

You can also see how we rate Tomamu versus other ski areas for various categories on our Japanese ski resort ratings.
See our video here

I had no idea what to expect we knew there was a dump -> so its a 1 something hour drive from Furano, and we were pumping fresh tracks through the easy wide pines on the right-hand resort for the first half of the day, got lost in out of bounds between the two resorts (stick within 50 meters of the run, and you should be okay) - so have a clue before you go, not the easiest walkout.

The left-hand side of the resort has a lot of good terrains, but gets chopped up affair bit - thus tree runs are your friends, and there is a very good amount of terrain to explore.

The food is pretty decent as well - will come back again for sure.
See our video here

We were a little worried that the Club Med Tomamu that opened in 17/18 would increase the competition for the powder at Tomamu. We needn’t have worried though because whilst Club Med had definitely increased the number of international guests on the slopes, it seemed that the majority were there to make the most of the included lessons and kids’ programs.

The demographic of guests staying at the resort hotels has also changed since Tomamu was bought by a Chinese company. Cons of this include that staying and dining at the resort owned hotels has become much more expensive, and any Japanese culture that was previously present has diminished. A major pro is that most of the hotel guests are beginner skiers, or they don’t ski or ride at all. Whilst they may create some minor queues for the gondola, they are unlikely to steal your fresh powder.

We still hold a special spot in our hearts for Tomamu considering that the inception of Powderhounds.com occurred on the old pizza box single chair lift. Yelling to each other between the single chairs, we decided that we needed to start a website to share our powder destination insights and we came up with the name for the website; all in one chair lift ride (it was a pretty slow chair back in those days). The new replacement chair is fast and there are more people out chasing the powder these days, but there remains plenty of pros about Tomamu, the main one being the quality of the powder in the backcountry.

See the Tomamu overview page for more on the pros and cons, and also see the Japanese ski resorts ratings to see how it compares.
See our video here

It depends why you are going to the snow, but for Advanced rider/skiers with children, looking for value for money, amazing powder days, all round ease it is very very hard to go past this place. I could go on for hours about the pros of this place, and the few cons, but I highly highly recommend it. I have boarded and skied in Austria, Switzerland, New Zealand, Australia, USA and Canada and this is hands down the best place for families I have been to so far.
See our video here

Best 4 lift ski resort ever!(disregarding the romance access chair and the baby chair)
At Tomamu they are shutting down lifts Left Right and Centre, literally.
Tower Peak seen with its 4 towers in no longer lifted (study map closely) to the top, being only serviced by a lift that goes 3/4 of the way up. The chair on the other side of the resort is also not open. The top high speed quad chair compensates for the other chair decommissioned.
Despite this we had a great family holiday at Tomamu.
Snow quality in Jan was excellent , no crowds, excellent terrain, great food options, fun apres ski activities for the kids,(skating and ice village). Registering for the powder area was no major issue and such as a relief to be able to enjoy the pow without feeling like a truant school boy.

The other downside of the resort is their very low threshold to shut down the 3 main lifts due to "high winds" . This happened a lot , leaving us only the tower peak chair to ski.
Now that Club Med have bought the place it will be interesting to watch developments.

TOMAMU CAT SKIING
I saddled up for my first taste of CAT skiing at Tomamu.
Unfortunately sat 28 jan was marred by 90 to 100km/h gusts of wind. Consequently the pow was wind blown and by the afternoon on the exposed runs, blown away.
The operation is more geared towards selling you the video of the days skiing at the end. Every run was filmed by the cameraman , one boarder at a time, necessitating lots of standing around.
The runs were short, terrain intermediate, and ending in the gully leading back to the road.
Lunch was served in a sturdy permanent tent and was outstanding.
The guides were very generous and helpful , loaning me a powder board when mine proved woefully inadequate for the snow conditions, and the day was overall a good experience .
We did 8 to 10 runs, most short, two being next to cat track for various reasons .
For mine, more boarding , less filming , standing would have made it a lot better .
See our video here

When I was doing research for Tomamu I struggled to find out a lot of information about the resort (especially the terrain) and had no real idea what I was in for. I have just returned from a 10 day family trip and thought I would try to put my thoughts into writing in the hope that it might help out someone deciding if this place is right for them?

Terrain:
The overall terrain is not super steep but the inbound skiable terrain does have a reasonably good mix of runs that can accomodate beginner skiers/riders through to fairly advanced. There are a lot of wide open perfectly groomed piste runs that suit beginners and intermediates as well as open runs that are left ungroomed for powder riding enthusiasts (aren't we all?). It is very flat at the bottom base lifts so this could be a problem for young skiers unable to maintain their speed across the flat.

The hardcore skier may become quite tiresome or bored of the inbound runs after only a couple of days, especially if there isn't consistent fresh snow falls to keep it interesting. The 'jewel in the crown' would have to be the gladed tree skiing in the so called 'experts only' powder skiing areas where there is a system in place for powder riders to obtain a daily permit to be allowed to ski these designated areas, but once again this is very dependant on fresh snow falls

The resort itself is predominantly marketed to the Chinese tourist and the family ski holiday maker so when there is a powder day there's a good chance there won't be too many people chasing the POW through the trees like Niseko or one of the more Westernised resorts. I found that there was more people in the breakfast line than at the lift line so that is definitely a plus!

Lodging/accomodation:
There was no real prexisting town or city at Tomamu before the ski resort was built meaning that all facilities and infrastructure have been purpose built for the ski resort and this is where it gets weird. Lodging is in true 'resort' style accomodation and whilst it is ski-in/ski-out the focus doesn't seem to be on skiing but giving a 'resortafied' experience for the guest. Whilst the large tower style accomodation buildings at the base of the hill are striking, the set up design can only be described as extremely strange. We stayed in the Risonaire towers and the total liveable area is absolutely huge including 2 queen size beds in the master room with ensuite, 2 beds in the second room, spa, sauna (yes sauna), 2 bathrooms, 2 showers and a very good size lounge room.

Whoever designed this place was clearly on acid as there is no real flow to the infrastructure and each lodging area appears to run separately to to each other even though they are all interconnected and running from the same resort. There is a covered walkway (or fridge as we liked to call it) that runs between all the accomodation options, restaurants and amenities but take a jacket as it's not heated!

I found that most of the Chinese resort staff were not keen skiers/boarders and that there isn't much understanding of basic skiers requirements and preferences. There are no ski tuning facilities available at all and there isn't even a shop that can professionally tune, edge or wax so make sure you are self sufficient if you are a serious skier. What was most baffling to me was that there wasn't a real drying room to leave boots or wet gear. There was a ski locker available on the ground floor but the room was not heated or closed up to dry overnight?

In saying all of the above the 'Resort Style' accomodation definitely would appeal to some people want ski hire ski facilities and easy access to the runs. Families and the not so hardcore skiers may actually really enjoy that style of accomodation.

Summary: I would definitely recommend a stay at Tomamu for family's or for the not so hardcore cruiser looking for a resort style experience. For the hardcore skier I would see this as a day or side trip from another resort. For novelty value alone it is worth checking out for a short trip but anything more than a few days might be a bit much for the serious skier.
See our video here

We have a soft spot for Tomamu because Powderhounds.com was born at Tomamu on the single suicide chair (the top lift) many years ago. It seemed ludicrous that there was this amazing ski resort for powder hounds, and barely anyone there to enjoy it, so we started a website to tell people about great powder skiing destinations.

These days some things haven’t changed at Tomamu. The resort has had a major facelift and new chair lifts (the suicide aka pizza box chair lift has been replaced by a high speed quad chair), yet surprisingly there is still very little competition for the powder. We are a little baffled as to why a lot more foreigners don’t visit this resort considering the many many pros: lots of family activities, kids ski lessons in English, good value ski-in ski-out accommodation, lots of dining options, easy access, good lifts etc etc. The only potential downside is for those looking for a traditional Japanese village or vibrant nightlife.

And for powder hounds it’s definitely worthy of a few days visit (or at least a day trip from Furano). Off-piste riding is permitted and thankfully you don’t have to wear the silly vests anymore. The snow quality on the backside is usually superb and the terrain lots of fun (more so for skiers than snowboarders due to the amount of traversing) and if you’ve got skins or snowshoes then there’s powder galore on offer.

See the Tomamu overview page for more on the pros and cons, and also see the Japanese ski resorts ratings to see how it compares.
See our video here

Tomamu was pretty good in early 2014.

We came via Rusutsu, where the snow was far deeper and drier, so Tomamu came off looking worse, but these things can change week to week. The terrain was pretty amazing, lifting capacity good. Wearing the silly powder vests to go off piste was easy but got old very quickly.

Maybe we were tired by week 3 of smashing Hokkaido pow but the three highlights were
1. the great proximity of the hotel to the slope (ride the elevator down from your hotel room, exit hotel, one flight of stairs and you get on the chair.)
2. the breakfast buffets. magnifique.
3. the mascots. I had never before paid attention to ski area mascots but we fell in love with snow-eating Nepo and her evil nemesis. (again did I mention the fatigue)

Overall good but maybe not good enough to revisit.
See our video here