Mt. Fuji

Here`s the first real post from this new blog site. I decided to change the format of the blog because I am not so computer savvy and this one seems easier to use. Also, it allows non-members to post comments so please feel free!

August was a very busy month that saw us going to a city called Ise to see a famous shrine, Tokyo Disneyland (for one last touch of J-cheese) and Mt. Fuji. All the pictures should be up on the site shortly.

The highlight and lowpoint of the month was definitely climbing the great Fuji-san. There are many sayings about climbing Japan`s highest and most famous mountain... `climb Fuji once and you are wise, climb twice and you are a fool` is the only one I can remember right now. The person who thought of that wasn`t kidding.

We started out at 6:30am Thursday on a bus from Nagoya to a small town called Kawaguchiko. After a 5 hour bus ride we arrived and boarded a bus to the fifth station on the mountain. The mountain itself is 3776m tall but most people start at the 5th station... About 2000m. We passed the time at the station, reading, lounging outside and buying the obligatory Mt.Fuji hiking pole. We started climbing at about 6:30, this was one of our many mistakes.

The trek to the first couple of stations wasn`t so bad and admittedly I caught myself thinking `this isn`t going to be so bad!`. Boy was I wrong! The sunset was spectacular and at the time we were the only ones on that part of the mountain. As night set in and the stars came out, the clouds rolled in bringing thunder and lightning. At this point I seriously thought we were going to be hit by lightning as we booted it to the nearest station. After this point the night is a blur of exhaustion, nausea and near hypothermia haha.

We chose not to stay at any of the huts along the way, another big mistake, so we climbed like drones for 8 hours without sleeping or really resting. Closer to the summit we met up with hundreds of other climbers, in tour groups naturally, who were being lead by guides. We all trudged the last few hours together in a long line. Looking back down the mountain was like watching a long train of ants with headlamps. As we walked the guides kept yelling `Genki desu ka?` at their charges (this means `are you good`) and the climbers would yell back `GENKI DESU` (I`m good!). As the night progressed the yells from the climbers dwindled to a few frustrated grunts.

When we finally crossed the torii at the summit, after about an hour of near vertical climbing, I thought I was going to die. Luckily enough I didn`t and I could watch the sun rise over a sea of clouds. It was really spectacular and almost worth all the pain.

On the way back down the sun and warmth rejuvenated me and I was actually happy that we had conquered the mountain. After 4 hours of switchbacks I was not quite so happy but the feeling of accomplishment stayed with me. The climb was not so physically challenging, but it was one of the most mentally challenging things I have ever done. I will NEVER go near Mt. Fuji again but I`m glad we had the chance to climb it once.

We arrived back in Nagoya at 11pm Friday, after nearly 36 hours of being awake we crashed and had a damn good sleep.