Visiting Snow Monkeys in Japan

On Friday, February 12th we headed up to Nagano. We got there late but spending the night enabled us to get us early and go visit the snow monkeys in Japan. This is a pretty popular thing to do in Japan. Unfortunately, we did not have the chance to do it last year which made us even more excited to have the chance to do it this year! While you can visit the snow monkeys anytime of the year, it is recommended to do it in the winter. This is because the mountains are usually snow-covered, and the monkeys come down from the snow-covered mountains to bathe in the hot springs. While the hot spring pool area is artificially constructed, the water is naturally heated from hot spring in the mountain.

Honestly, we were really excited to see the monkeys, as we have heard it is a very cool thing to do and see. However, actually going there and seeing these monkeys in person far exceeded our

expectations. This has been one of the coolest thing we have done in Japan! If you ever visit Japan in the winter, this is an absolute MUST!

For the record, the photos below were all taken by Miklos. He was prepared with his high quality camera, and a special lens that gave him a great zoom and focus!