The west coast of the main island of Japan is probably for its latitude (roughly, from Cape Hatteras to New York, or from Spanish Morocco to Barcelona) the snowiest region in the world. From December to April or May only the railroads are open, and the snow in the mountains is sometimes as much as fifteen feet deep.The expression “snow country,” then, does not mean simply country where snow falls. It means very specifically the part of the main island that lies west of the central mountain range. It suggests long, gray winters, tunnels under the snow, dark houses with rafters black from the smoke of winter fires—and perhaps chilblains, or, to the more imaginative, life divorced from time through the long snowbound months.The hot springs, one of which is the locale of Snow Country, also have a peculiarly Japanese significance. The Japanese seldom goes to a hot spring for his health, and he never goes for “the season,” as people once went to Bath or Saratoga. He may ski or view maple leaves or cherry blossoms, but his wife is usually not with him.
