Japan Photo Guide Recommends: Sapporo Snow Festival

Feb 03 | Evan | No Comments |

Japan has many festivals throughout the year, but honestly, most of them share a lot of similar elements (parades, fireworks, carrying portable shrines) and tend to be somewhat overrated *cough* Gion Matsuri *cough*. That being said, there are certainly some incredible festivals that make for some unique and wonderful experiences. My favorite one is probably the Sapporo Snow Festival.  The Sapporo Snow Festival, is of course, in Sapporo and occurs each year at the begining of February.  The 2011 Sapporo Snow Festival starts February 7th, 2011 and ends on the 13th of February,

Before I talk about traveling to Sapporo for the festival, let’s talk about Sapporo the city.  Sapporo is one of my favorite cities in Japan.  It’s easy to understand and get around Sapporo and while Sapporo is a large city, it’s not nearly as overwhelming as Tokyo.  Also, the food in Sapporo is incredible, especially the seafood (not that anywhere in Japan really has bad seafood) and their famous Sapporo stlye ramen, miso butter corn ramen to be exact.  Whether you are eating lunch on a cold day, or capping off a night with friends, Sapporo Ramen hits the spot.  

So back to the Sapporo Snow Festival…  I would recommend traveling to Sapporo in any case, but if you are going to go and have your choice of when to visit Sapporo, travel there for the snow festival!  At the festival, besides all the events and festival general goodness that goes on, the main attraction are of course the giant snow and ice sculptures.  If you plan your visit to Sapporo just before the festival starts, you can watch the artists put the finishing touches on their sculptures, which is really interesting.

 

 

During the day you will be spending time mainly at Odori Park, or if you want to play in the snow, Tsudome has some gigantic snow slides, snow mazes and so on.  At night, the Suskino Ice Festival comes to life.  Susukino is the night life distric of Sapporo and during the ice festival, Susukino brings the party to the streets!  The ice sculptures here are a lot smaller than what you find at Odori Park, but still amazing.  Oh, and they also have bars made of ice where you can get your hot adult beverages or take a shot down a ice slide.

 

For more information about The Sapporo Snow Festival, my favorite festival in Japan, check out Japan-Guide.com‘s post about it.  Want to go to the next Sapporo Snow Festival on a guided tour to Japan?  Contact me now to make a reservation for this high demand festival in Japan!