We decided to plaster the walls with a Japanese product called Shikkui plaster. For days and nights in a row, Dutchie managed to do this job all by himself. Shikkui Plaster is a traditional and innovative Japanese lime plaster made of slaked lime of high calcium purity. It contains materials like seaweed extracts, natural plant fibre and other natural aggregates such as eggshell powder. It has been widely used throughout Japan for both internal and external walls of houses, temples and castles, as well as for ceilings and decorative purposes for over one thousand years.  

It truly started to look like an oiled machine. Once Dutchie would finish plastering a part of the downstairs floor, team ‘Floor’ followed him to put the wooden finished floor down. Since it is hard to find a proper wooden floor in Japan we decided upon buying a blank floor which we oiled ourselves. At the start of November Bart, Merijns brother in law came over as crowd renovator. By offering his skills for 2 weeks he has definitely added an important share to the lodge, for which we are very grateful! And of course also to Merijns sister, who stayed at home with their two little girls.

The area in the house that was completed at first is the kitchen. Knowing Dutchie, this is not surprising, although the main reason for this was so that Merel could start her preparations for the season right after she arrived half October. One of the most important pieces of equipment in the kitchen is the commercial steam oven. Especially considering it is 200 kilo and it took 5 people and two wooden beams to lift it inside.

Once the floors and walls were finished the fire department came in to check our lodge. This check is part of the pension license process. Every accommodation in Japan needs to be in possession of this license in order to be officially recognized. During their visit, they check whether or not you used fireproof material, e.g. paint, carpets, curtains, plaster, etc.  Of course, a properly working fire alarm, fire extinguishers and emergency exit signs also needed to be checked off the list. And, since our system was very much outdated, much had to be replaced. Luckily after inspection, only a few minor things needed to be changed and after this, we managed to pass the fire inspection! Next up: health and safety inspection.

The coming blog we will spend on the finishing touches of the downstairs floor, the upgrades of the ensuites and the guest rooms. Below a few pics of our other crowd renovators working hard and enjoying the fireplace in the lounge after. Thank you guys!

Naena Waterfall

During the renovations we still had plenty of time to enjoy the surroundings we took a hike up towards Naena waterfall. Where most people just do the easy 10-minute walk to get to the stunning waterfall, of course, we had to explore further up. This led us to a spot where we skied during winter, after a skin up Kurohime Kogen. The 55m waterfall is a great piece of nature and it is worth going there several times a year since it looks surprisingly different during every season.

Madarao Kogen Hotel

Madarao Kogen Hotel is the biggest hotel in Madarao and situated right at the slopes. It has a great onsen with an indoor and an outdoor bath which is also open for the public. On top of that, it was one of the few restaurants that would sometimes be open during weekends in Madarao during the summer (off)season. You can choose to either eat from a buffet or order a traditional Japanese menu. Of course, we went for the traditional Japanse menu. This was also the farewell dinner of Annie’s parents, our crowd renovators that came over in September. 

The post #5 Crowd renovators appeared first on Japan Snowsports.

Since the entire floors got stripped (see #2 Demolition), the entire floor surface of the ground floor had to be redone, starting with floor joys. A fluffy layer of glass wool in between the joys will keep our feet nice and warm coming winter.

Before we covered the insolation and floor joys with floorboards we took this opportunity to move all water pipes under the floor. No more pipes on the ceiling!!

Let’s move to the walls. To prevent the moist coming back in and after seeking advice from some local experts, we decided on a solid construction for all exterior walls, existing off:

• Foamboard
• Air layer
• A wooden frame
• A vapour barrier behind the wooden frame
• Glass wool within this wooden frame
• Fireproof gip board (which declares the beautiful pink colour:))

In total, this construction added 10 CM on the inside of the exterior walls!

Although we demolished a few walls, we have also built up a new one. We created a dividing wall between the new laundry room (that gives access to the boiler room) and the common area.

With all this amazing hard work being done, the walls were ready for some plastering! More about this in a later blog….

Downhill mountain biking

A summer activity you see in many ski resorts around the world is downhill mountain biking. Since the lift infrastructure is there it’s an awesome way to create some business in summer as well. In Japan, ski resorts slowly but surely start to realize this. Our friend Sam (www.gomyoko.com) is developing the region Madarao and Myoko region as a whole year around the tourist area. One of the things he is trying to draw more attention to is downhill mountain biking. The good thing about Madarao is that there already is a track and a bike rental! We definitely see a lot of potential for an awesome summer activity! Of course, we had to try it out ourselves first, so we hopped on the chair lift and zipped down the trail. A nice cooling down afterwards in lake Nojiri made it a perfect day off!

The Lamp

Having lived at Nojiriko last winter, guesthouse and restaurant The Lamp was only 500m away from us. A great place run by a nice crew of young people where you can just have a coffee and do some work, have one of their amazing burgers for lunch or go for dinner at night. During summer, being surrounded by the mountains and situated right at the lake, The Lamp appears to be a famous getaway to cool down from the heat, humidity and busy life in the cities. Next to sleeping and eating, they organize a yearly SUP festival and many other activities throughout the year. Join one of their SUP or Kayak tours during summer, or a snowshoe tour during winter. Another must-do on one of your nights during your stay in the mountains around Myoko and Madarao is to have their amazing Nabe (Japanese hotpot, make sure you reserve in advance). Even better, it includes a shuttle service from and to your accommodation which suits perfectly with their all you can drink add- -on;)

While we’re counting down the days until the first snow, there is still some work to do! In the coming weeks we will post more frequently, because the lodge is changing rapidly at the moment. Thanks for showing your interest in our project. We are getting more excited every day and hope to welcome you soon in the Japan Snowsports Lodge! The next blog, Merel will show you around in our kitchen!

The post Blog #4: floors and walls appeared first on Japan Snowsports.

On a side note and in case you are wondering: the lodge did survive the typhoon that hit Japan last week. Since Madarao is situated on 900 m elevation we didn’t get affected substantially, apart from hard wind gusts and rain. However, the valley did suffer from floodings and landslides. We would like to express our deep respect to all the rescue workers and volunteers who are still cleaning up the mess Hagibis left behind. 

Now, back to the Lodge….

We faced the major surprises and made a masterplan. This is what it looks like:

The ground floor, that has a beautiful view, is our breakfast and dining room. Merijn is currently working on a design for a long table made of timber, as we would love to seat our guests along our chef’s table together!

On one side you’ ll find the kitchen, and on the other end, a wood stove and a cosy ensuite lounge to relax after riding and dining. Here you can have beers, chats and watch movies, too.

Being a chef himself, Dutchie could not run a lodge without serving food. Because he will be out on the slopes he will not be able to run the kitchen himself. Therefore, Merel, our friend from the Netherlands will help us out in the lodge as well as in the kitchen. Merel has learned cooking on the job in various well-known restaurants in Amsterdam. Next to that, she runs her own catering company. One of her specialities is baking bread. With her experience baking organic, slow-rise sourdough bread. We will serve homemade bread with breakfast on a daily base. 

Dinners will not be served daily but on a regular base and per request The restaurant will also be open for guests from outside the lodge (e-mail: lodge@jpsnowsports.com for reservations!). Similar to breakfast, dining will be done altogether around a long table that fits 20 guests. No need to worry about what to choose from the menu, because a chef’s menu will be served. Imagine a 6-course meal, with cross-cultural food, local wines and sake and good company. What else can you wish for after a long day on the slopes…..

Sorry….I got carried away daydreaming about the finish line. I can just totally see myself sitting there, zipping my wine next to the fireplace….

Time to wake up! Although it’s good to keep an eye on the dot on the horizon, we are not there yet! 

Dutchie has been renovating houses before and of course, there is me (read: clumsy and slightly uncoordinated) to help out wherever I can. However, this wasn’t a project he could take on by himself. Therefore, a big task during this period was to find people that could help us and collect quotes from them. 

Readers who have experience in renovating most probably know that the first stage of building up is to prepare everything. A very important, but one of the least satisfying jobs since everything you do will not be visible when it’s all finished. After taking out the entire floor we discovered the old piping in the concrete hovering in big holes and many random holes that we didn’t know the purpose of. Nice and breezy and moist under your feet in winter. After a few hours of grinding and many disks later to remove all the old steel piping, it was time to get the concrete mill turning for a few days to fill all holes and level the floor.

We removed all the cladding on the walls and removed a few walls entirely. Armed with a specula and many bags of filler, we smoothed everything out… ready for the next layer! Working on the walls we discovered a few concrete walls were wet due to being underground with lots of water pressing from the outside. After a few failed attempts, we eventually got the right product to waterproof the concrete. Oh yeah, did I mentioned the 4 days on a ladder to remove the foam that was sprayed on the ceiling on the entire ground floor?

When you looked up in the kitchen you travel back in time. Six layers of paint peeling off in different degrees. Two days of choking on dust brought it back to bare concrete again.

Fuji Rock Festival

Whoever finds him or herself in Japan at the end of July should definitely consider going to the 3 days international Fuji Rock Festival. Fuji Rock was held for the first time in 1997. Naeba Ski resort is hosting it since ‘99. On the lineup, this year you find names like The Chemical Brothers, the Lumineers and many other international as well as Japanese artists. Every year, they organize a free night on the night before the actual festival starts. This is how we got to taste a bit of the great atmosphere.

A typical festival snack you see a lot on Japanese festivals is Fish on a Stick (see picture above). As a matter of fact: we happen to know the guy who you see working behind this stand. Our friend and former boss Patrick (Snowcountry Instructors) helps out his brother in law and owner of the Takahan Ryokan every year, selling thousands of fishes a day! Takahan is the oldest Ryokan in town and beautifully located. Definitely worth staying at if you are visiting lively Yuzawa.

In our coming episode, we will write about: floors and walls! Stay tuned and, as always, leave a comment if you like.

The post #3 Preparation appeared first on Japan Snowsports.