Welcome to my next trip report series, covering a recent trip we took to Japan with friends, including skiing in Niseko, plus a quick stopover in Tokyo. This was a really fun trip, and I can’t recommend a visit to Niseko enough.
In this series, you can expect flight reviews of Japan Airlines’ 777-300ER first class, Japan Airlines’ A350-900 Class J, All Nippon Airways’ 737-800 Premium Class, All Nippon Airways’ A380 first class, Hawaiian Airlines’ 787-9 first class, and Delta’s A321neo first class. On top of that, there will be reviews of several luxury points hotels, including the Tokyo EDITION Toranomon, Tokyo EDITION Ginza, Park Hyatt Niseko, and Ritz-Carlton Reserve Niseko.
In this post I’ll outline all the basics of the trip, and then I’ll publish the entire trip report series in the coming days and weeks.
In this post:
Why we took this trip
Ford and I try to take one ski trip per year (okay, in all honesty, we take a ski trip for him, and I mostly enjoy the snowy views and the après-ski), and we try to mix up where we travel to.
The United States of course has some great skiing areas in terms of the quality of snow, though everything else about the experience is lackluster, from the service, to the dining, to the value.
In recent years, we’ve largely been going to Europe to ski, where conditions aren’t necessarily as good, but everything else is amazing, like the hotels, dining, service, etc. For example, we’ve checked out Les Airelles Courchevel, Airelles Val d’Isère, and Four Seasons Megeve.
This time around we decided to mix things up, and ski in Asia for the first time. Japan is probably my favorite place in the world to visit, and Niseko, in the the country’s northern Hokkaido region, is known for offering amazing skiing. Best of all, it has an ever-increasing number of luxury hotels, some of which are bookable with points.
So that’s where we decided to ski for this season, and we’re so happy with that decision. As usual, I did what I could to review as many interesting airline and hotel products as possible, and in particular, I had quite the itinerary on the return.
In terms of the flying portion of this trip, I flew a total of four segments, spread across 17,459 miles, and below is what that routing looked like.
The airlines we flew on this trip
I booked this itinerary as six separate tickets. While Ford and I flew the outbound together, I took a more roundabout return, to review some products that have been on my list (Ford flew back separately on a more direct routing).
While this trip had been planned many months in advance, I ended up tweaking my routing quite a bit, and only booked all the flights within a few weeks of departure, thanks to the options that opened up.
To kick off the trip, we flew Japan Airlines’ Boeing 777-300ER first class from San Francisco to Tokyo Haneda, and we also managed to include the positioning flight on American on this itinerary. We even managed to snag four first class award seats on this flight, so that we could travel with our friends.
We booked the following for the per person cost of 80,000 American AAdvantage miles plus $16.80 in taxes & fees:
2/28 AA2426 Miami to San Francisco departing 7:40PM arriving 11:20PM
3/01 JL1 San Francisco to Tokyo departing 12:55PM arriving 5:20PM (+1 day)
Funny story — we booked this only a few days before departure. I initially booked the San Francisco to Tokyo flight, as the Miami to San Francisco positioning flight didn’t have saver level award availability. Literally an hour after booking, two first class award seats opened up on the perfect Miami to San Francisco flight. Talk about a score, given how hard domestic first class award availability can be to snag!
Next up, after a couple of nights in Tokyo, we flew Japan Airlines’ Airbus A350-900 Class J from Tokyo Haneda to Sapporo (with Sapporo being the closest airport to Tokyo). I booked the following for the per person cost of $168.14:
3/04 JL513 Tokyo to Sapporo departing 11:30AM arriving 1:10PM
For the return portion of the trip, I had to first position to Tokyo Narita, and between All Nippon Airways and Japan Airlines, there’s just one nonstop flight per day, which wasn’t all that cheap. So I booked All Nippon Airways’ Boeing 737-800 Premium Class, on the following flight for $311.26:
3/11 NH2154 Sapporo to Tokyo departing 1:40PM arriving 3:30PM
Perhaps for the most exciting segment of the trip, I flew All Nippon Airways’ Airbus A380 first class from Tokyo to Honolulu. I booked the following for 57,500 Virgin Atlantic Flying Club points (which I earned with a 30% transfer bonus) and $199.41 in taxes & fees:
3/11 NH183 Tokyo to Honolulu departing 9:15PM arriving 9:05AM
I then booked a same day connection to Hawaiian’s Boeing 787-9 first class from Honolulu to Los Angeles. I booked the following for $800.75:
3/11 HA2 Honolulu to Los Angeles departing 12:40PM arriving 8:50PM
Last but not least, I took a redeye flight to get back home. I typically avoid domestic redeye flights at all cost, but I figured in this case it would be different, since I had been adjusted to Japan’s timezone for well over a week. So I flew Delta’s Airbus A321neo first class from Los Angeles to Fort Lauderdale. I booked the following for $663.48:
3/11 DL477 Los Angeles to Fort Lauderdale departing 10:20PM arriving 5:57AM (+1 day)
In addition to flight reviews, you can expect reviews of the following lounges:
- British Airways Lounge San Francisco (SFO)
- All Nippon Airways Lounge Sapporo (CTS)
- All Nippon Airways First Class Suite Lounge Tokyo Narita (NRT)
The hotels we stayed at on this trip
In this trip report series, I’ll be reviewing a total of four hotels, including two in Tokyo and two in Niseko.
We had two nights in Tokyo on the way out, so we decided to check out two different hotels — the Tokyo EDITION Toranomon and Tokyo EDITION Ginza. Obviously switching hotels on such a short visit isn’t ideal, but I really wanted to be able to compare these two hotels, as I walked away with very different impressions.
Then the primary destination for our trip was the Park Hyatt Niseko, where we spent five nights. I wasn’t sure what to expect from this property, but it exceeded my expectations, and we had a really lovely stay.
Lastly, since we were in Niseko anyway, we decided to spend a couple of nights at the Ritz-Carlton Reserve Niseko. The Ritz-Carlton Reserve brand is generally very well regarded, and I’ve had very good experiences at the brand’s properties in the past. However, this hotel left me a bit disappointed…
For what it’s worth, on the outbound portion of the trip we spent a night at the Grand Hyatt SFO. It’s one of my favorite airport hotels in the world, but I won’t be reviewing it this time around, given how short our stay was.
Bottom line
We had an incredible trip to Japan in late winter, spending a couple of nights in Tokyo, and then a week in Niseko. I absolutely love Japan, so this was an incredible change of pace for our typical annual ski trip. Best of all, we got to travel with friends, which is always more fun.
You can expect reviews of all kinds of different premium airline products, as well as reviews of four hotels in Japan that are bookable with points, which left me with varying impressions.
Thanks for reading, and stay tuned!
Ben,
Do you have a past summary post about the different subscription services that alert you when a seat opens up? Thanks
It’s great to see the proliferation of French and Japanese hotel reviews on OMAAT, especially ski hotels, as these two countries offer far outsized value for their high prices — and in many cases are bookable with points. Americans tired of the nickel-and-diming at places like Aspen and Vail will be no doubt pleased with what the Alps and Hokkaido can offer.
That said, it feels like Ben has been mostly going to France...
It’s great to see the proliferation of French and Japanese hotel reviews on OMAAT, especially ski hotels, as these two countries offer far outsized value for their high prices — and in many cases are bookable with points. Americans tired of the nickel-and-diming at places like Aspen and Vail will be no doubt pleased with what the Alps and Hokkaido can offer.
That said, it feels like Ben has been mostly going to France and Japan lately (and for very good reason — AF, ANA and JAL have truly outstanding products, and skiing there is the best!). It’s been ages since he last visited Australia, New Zealand, India, Turkey or the like, and he certainly hasn’t visited India, at least, postpandemic. So it would be nice to revisit some of these places for the next trip report series, especially with new inflight products.
In before the classic Mason ‘visualising Air France/JAL/Qsuite’ comment or a variation thereof! ;)
Ben is Niseko overrun with tourists? While I’m okay with that in theory, does it still have the Japanese culture (non-Miami culture) of quiet, respect, and honor?
Split between here and Nagano area for next winter. Placeholder flights secured, fingers crossed for last minute JL1 in F.
@ Sel, D. -- I'm not sure whether I'd say it's overrun with tourists, but it definitely gets busy. To answer your question, yes, I'd say there's still a very strong Japanese, non-Miami culture. In general, Niseko seems to have a lot of Australians, including a lot of seasonal labor from the country, so that's an interesting twist.
So it definitely doesn't feel quite as authentic as other parts of Japan, but I still felt...
@ Sel, D. -- I'm not sure whether I'd say it's overrun with tourists, but it definitely gets busy. To answer your question, yes, I'd say there's still a very strong Japanese, non-Miami culture. In general, Niseko seems to have a lot of Australians, including a lot of seasonal labor from the country, so that's an interesting twist.
So it definitely doesn't feel quite as authentic as other parts of Japan, but I still felt like it had the same qualities that make me love Japan.
Hope you have a great trip, regardless of which destination you decide on!
@ Ben - Since you planned this trip many months in advance, but only found the JAL First Class award space a few days before the departure, what were your backup bookings ? Did you had mileage tickets for a lower travel class or less interesting routing already ?
I am wondering what the best strategy is when you need to be at the destination at a given time. One strategy would be to buy refundable cash tickets.
@ Super -- It's a great question! For Ford, I had an ANA first class award that I locked in for him, so he could fly direct. I booked it with lifemiles and have a lifemiles+ subscription, so I could cancel that for free.
I didn't have an outbound for me, but I was really flexible as to what I was willing to fly, so I wasn't too worried. I saw several non-ideal options, and I was happy to take any of those. But I hadn't actually locked in anything.
When it came to your friends flights, did you just tell them what to book and when? Or did they do their own routing, and then joined you for the JAL F portion?
Respectfully, the flights booked by Ben’s friends are none of our business. Ben’s friends are incredibly wealthy. For all we know, they flew private Boeing jets, Global Express, out the country but the blueberry still connect
@ Super -- We were monitoring options together, especially in the days leading up to departure. So when we saw that four first class award seats opened up, they booked two out of their accounts, and we booked two out of our accounts.
Such a fun trip and one that was well deserved!