I find Liquid Snow Tours very helpful because they know Japan inside-out. One of the pointers on this trip was the two different type of JR East Cards. Unfortunately these cards can not be obtained at the beginning of the trip, the 14 days start on the date that the receipt is turned into a ticket. Our in between travel day between resorts was a Sunday and our preferred JR Service Office was not open on a Sunday, requiring us to travel all the way back to Tokyo. Not a problem but something that Liquid Snow Tours should take into consideration. Zao is a bit of an intermediate resort, but very local atmosphere, and Nozawa has almost too many Australians now.