The scale & scope of ice in Japan

There’s a lot more ice climbing in Japan that people realize, including a lot of Japanese. Our trips regularly cover numerous places in a single itinerary, including easy warm up ice through to harder stuff, traveling the country for the best of what’s out there.

Like our expeditions elsewhere, we are highly mobile so can travers the length of Japan, from the quiet hidden valleys of Hokkaido and Yamagata to the remote alpine ranges in Takayama, Gifu and Yamanashi.

Some of the ice climbing in central Japan is becoming very well known, but there is much more beyond Yatsugatake, Hokuto and Mitsutoge. Deep in the Southern Japanese Alps there are entire valleys of ice falls that include the famous O-ren Tani routes, and north of Yamanashi there are dozens of routes around the eastern end of the Northern Alps.

Most mountain ranges between central and northern Honshu touch 2000m if not well over, meaning there are dozens of escarpments with mixed and ice climbing routes. Some are local classics that get regular climbers, but others have been kept quiet or even forgotten so are still wild and undisturbed.

Hokkaido has arguably the best known ice climbing in Japan, being the first place to get international attention back in the mid-2000s. The climbing around Sounkyo is well known, though very, very cold, and there are still unmentioned gems in side valleys that few visitors ever go to.