Running a ski lodge and raising a family in Myoko, Japan

The journey from Lima, Peru, to Myoko may not seem to be a linear path but for Augusto, aka “Kenji”, one that led him to where he needed to be. “I didn’t know about the mountains until I found them,” he explains. “I used to like the beach but when you get started with snowboarding and riding powder for the first time, it’s addictive and you can’t go back.”

Snow wasn’t the catalyst for coming to Japan, however. For this South American, a powder addiction would develop after a few more years of finding his place in the world.

Konayuki owner, Kenji

“My father is Peruvian but ethnically Japanese and a lot of my family already lived here,” Kenji begins in answering the “why Japan?” question.

“I got kicked out of university in Peru and my father said ‘I’m not gunna pay for shit anymore. If you want money you go to Japan and work’. So, I did. That was 16 years ago. I spent the first six years not speaking the language and not enjoying Japanese life much. It wasn’t until I started studying Japanese that life got more interesting”.

Kenji met his future wife, Konatsu, while driving a forklift around a copper pipe factory in Kanagawa. It was his wife who introduced him to the compulsive ups and downs of snowboarding. The season before Covid was the one during which everything changed for the future owners of Myoko’s Konayuki guest house.

“I caught an edge trying to do a 180 spin at Maiko Snow Resort (Yuzawa, Niigata) in early 2019 and broke my collarbone,” expounds Kenji. “I had a lot of time on my hands after that”.

The Konayuki family team (left to right): Kenji, baby Mia, Keiga and Konatsu

“Konatsu and I like staying in guest houses when we travel because we can meet people from all over. So, we had the idea of doing it ourselves. We started looking for a place when I broke my collarbone. During that time, we met a Myoko family through a common friend. They helped us find the place and we first saw it in May 2019.

We knew you can ski during winter and Nojiri Lake is close for the summer months, so we decided this was the place for us. We made the commitment without having snowboarded in Myoko or even seeing it during winter”.

Snowblowing outside Konayuki in Myoko

“I didn’t really know what to expect,” Kenji admits. “I had never used a snowblower before I came here. It was crazy and I almost flipped it once. The 2019/20 season supposedly had the least amount of snow in living memory but it was almost too much for me. It was probably a good year to get used to Myoko because since then the snow has gotten crazier and crazier. Last year I had to do it twice per day and it was really hard to keep up. During February I lost the battle. It became too hard. Luckily it was almost the end of the huge dumps by then”.

The hurdles haven’t stopped with excessive snow management. Kenji and Konatsu insist Covid’s silver linings were having more time to snowboard and get to know their regular domestic guests. But a growing family and business continue to present further welcome challenges. While their teenage son, Keiga, studies to be a snowboard instructor, baby Mia may not be able to provide much assistance at Konayuki over the coming few winters. Again, resolute optimism steers the ship.

“This year will be a challenge with a child but also an opportunity,” Kenji insists. “It’s good for kids to meet people and have a chance to hear different languages — maybe one day speak them. I don’t expect it will be easy, but I think it will be fun. We run the place as a family. Keiga is studying but will help out with Konayuki and the new place where he can.”

Kenji and Konatsu doing renovations

The “new place” is Arai Villa Myoko. Kenji and Konatsu have pressed pause on the renovations for the 2022/23 winter season, but their new self-contained property will be open in time for the next one. As the name suggests, Arai Villa Myoko is around the corner from the increasingly popular Lotte Arai Resort, about 20km up the road from Konayuki in Akakura.

“This is a new approach to our business to see how it is to run a self-contained property,” Kenji explains. “There are only a few self-contained accommodations in Myoko and nothing near Lotte Arai, as far as I know, so it sounds like a good idea.”

“We bought an old house only a few minutes by car to Lotte Arai Resort. Arai has been getting a lot of attention over the past few years. It was still busy during Covid, and we think there will be many people who want to ski there in the future but not necessarily stay at the resort itself.”

“The renovations are more extensive than those we did at Konayuki. Back to the bones rather than superficial stuff. It was an old house so it was necessary. They are being done half by DIY and half by hiring a company for the technical stuff. It will be open and ready to go by next summer.”

Konatsu embracing Myoko’s famous snowy conditions

Like many business owners in Myoko, Japan and planet Earth, Kenji and Konatsu’s business is one that relies on the ability of people to travel — a challenge that most in the tourism game will know. Not all make it through, however, for this family, the future looks more luminous than it has ever been. New projects and new family members offer inherent reasons to keep dark days in the past.

“Having a baby now makes things more interesting,” says Kenji. “I don’t just want to snowboard all the time. I want to teach my daughter to experience nature, know Myoko and be able to snowboard with us at some point in the near future. One of the best feelings is snowboarding with my family through the trees so I’m looking forward to Mia growing and being able to teach her how to snowboard.”