Evergreen Outdoor Center — Local services in Hakuba

You guys look like you run a good operation. Congratulations on your successful business.

However, please be mindful of other campers when you roll up in your busses, trucks, and vans with gas generators to a FREE public campsite. Perhaps in future you should charter PAID campsites if you are charging your customers for camping (in this case an International school with 30-40 kids).

You set up directly next to us when there was 900sqm of open, free space just 50m away and refused to use it simply for your own convenience when we kindly suggested you guys to set up there.

The kids (your customers) needed to be briefed on camping etiquette as they were walking back and forth through our site while we were eating dinner. We had to set up strip lights on the ground just to keep the kids from walking though our site. At 6:00 a.m. a few were converging directly outside our tents while yelling for each other, chatting, and singing. They were otherwise nice kids just having a great time and wouldn’t have known otherwise unless told by professionals like you or their teachers.

Lastly, at 8:00am you assembled 50 people just 3 meters from our breakfast table and shouted out the day’s plans, while some teachers shouted out for missing students. You could have been more mindful of us (who were the only other people there) and assembled everyone farther away as a simple courtesy so we could enjoy some semblance of peace first thing in the morning.

My friends flew in from Thailand to enjoy Kumano camping for 2 nights before moving on to explore Osaka. And although our trip certainly wasn’t ‘ruined’, it could have been MUCH better and peaceful had you guys stepped up the game on the etiquette side of things.

Just my opinion, but commercial businesses shouldn’t be using free sites and charging their customers for camping services while disturbing others who have traveled far distances at great expense to enjoy the peace of the outdoors. Please think about chartering private campsites for your purposes. It may lessen your bottom line, but it will support small-town business and show respect to...

WORST EXPERIENCE EVER GUYS! Pls, Hakuba Snow School at IIMORI is much better than this overrated Evergreen ski school. I booked online and this is my first ski experience ever, coming from a no-snow country, obviously i do not know anything about the process and all. First thing I asked when booking is (and it's at the question column/box was, "is this inclusive of ski gears?" i know this question might sound stupid to you but like i said, coming from a no-snow country, i do not know the process. Guess what, no answer. What's the purpose of putting a question box/column when u are not going to answer ur client's question?!

Since I did not receive the answer, I had an assumption that maybe it's included, otherwise they would really remind me to settle that before coming. So I came without the ski gears, and the most they could do is recommend a place to rent and just came back as soon as possible. we missed 45 mins of our lesson!!!! Not a single help or flexibility knowing that u were also at fault for not attending to my question in the first place!

you're such a big name, and i'm sure u have encountered this kind of issues before, and not providing a quick solution that wont lead to ur client mising 45 mins of their lesson is such a big red flag!

other than that, the stupid receptionist, knowing that it is our first time and we have only about 1 hour left for the lesson, stupidly asked us to buy the lift tickets as well, at Kokusai slope which is not beginner friendly at all and we ended up not using it at all. what a waste of money. i bought 4 full day tix for that day and didnt use it coz we only had 1 hour lesson. I wanna state this again, do not come to this place if you dont want to burn ur money.

also, u should have mentioned the meet up place was at kokusai slope. JUST SO MANY...

I had two kids in day camps at Evergreen: an 11 year old in Water Wizards and an 8 year old in Nagano Ninjas. Both had a good time overall, and really liked most of the activities they got to participate in.

What is really great about this experience - apart from all the cool outdoor activities, of course - is how internationally diverse the people are relative to the general population, both among the campers and the guides. I think that’s a real strength. My kids are being raised in Japan but can follow along without issue in English and participate when pushed, though they were probably among the quieter kids in the camp - they were also 2 of 3 day campers, with the vast majority of kids being in the overnight program, so they had less opportunity to integrate with the group. But the diversity really exposes kids to different cultures and that’s irreplaceable, all while doing fun things outside.

If I had any complaints, it would be two things. (1) The Water Wizards camp begun with a hike, but there were no team building activities before hand so my kid thought it was pretty boring and like he hadn’t really done anything. (2) Honestly, the price tag feels high. It’s hard to find similar international experiences like this in Japan, so I recognize it’s pretty niche, and Hakuba itself is not cheap. That said, I’d pay it again, so this is more a grumble than a true complaint.

Last anecdote to close things out. As day campers, I dropped my kids off at the meeting point each morning and picked them up each evening. It was really fun meeting and chatting with all the guides who accompanied them. You get sense of community and everyone seemed pretty jazzed all the time. I got the sense right away my kids were in great hands.

We hope to see you at Evergreen...