Rokko-san Ice Festival

These are pictures from the ice festival on the top of Mt. Rokko just outside of Kobe. It was amazing how the weather changed with elevation. Down in the city it was beautiful and sunny and at the top of the mountain it was basically a blizzard! It was a really fun trip though!

There is supposed to be a beautiful night view of Kobe from the top of Rokko-san, but it was pretty hazy this day and you would need a tripod to get a nice photo:


The blizzard!



Some of the ice sculptures:




We were able to watch some of the sculpting in action! Here they were making a whale-shark as part of a larger sea-scape. They had all kinds of tools: saws, chisels, torches, buckets of water... It was really interesting!


It was so cold and we were all freezing so we were eager to try out this small foot bath with onsen (hot spring) water for warming up your toes and feet! It was the best!



There were lots of fun activities like ice-slides and ice-fishing:



More sculptures:



Me in an igloo :)


Doraemon.