Popular wisdom has it that snowmen (or, indeed, snow-women) need to be built of human effort.
You know the drill – a heavy fall of winter white; huge round balls of the stuff rolled round and round the garden to create the body and head; pebbles for eyes; old carrot from the back of the fridge for a nose; expendable scarf for that quirky final touch.
But as these fine images show, snow-people can also be forged by nature’s delicate hand.
"They look like snow monsters; like they are ghosts" Photo: Sho Shibata/Solent News
They were taken by Japanese photographer Sho Shibata during a hike in the Hakkoda mountains of Aomori (the northernmost prefecture of Japan’s biggest island, Honshu).
This remote range – which comes to a head at the 5197ft (1,584m) summit of Mount Odake – receives heavy snowfall in December. The effects this year have been especially grand, with the precipitation recasting Hakkoda’s fir trees as an army of petrified statues.
“This is my favourite place to visit when it is cold like this,” Mr Shibata explains. “It transforms into a wonderland.
“What is incredible is how [the trees] all look so similar. They look like snow monsters; like they are ghosts.”
This sensational scene was prompted by temperatures plunging towards -10 Celsius – not uncommon in Japan during the winter. And while such weather makes travel a prospect for only the more intrepid among us, journeys in search of splendid snow can often be their own reward during the chilly months – as the following cold comforts demonstrate...
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