"You are wise to climb Mount Fuji, but a fool to do it twice."
--Japanese Proverb
Hiking Mt. Fuji has been near the top of my "Must Do While In Japan" list pretty much since we got here last August (holy crap, we've been here a year already! Craziness!). But you can't just go around climbing to the top of Fuji-san whenever you feel like it. Besides the small complexities of arranging it so Brian could get leave from the hospital to go, coordinating schedules, mapping out the game plan, etc..., the Mt. Fuji hiking trails are only open from around July 1 through September 10. That's a pretty limited window of time! And with the jam-packed summer we've been having, the only chunk of time that worked for both of us was 1.5 days after we got back from our U.S. trip. Call us crazy, but we went for it and locked it into our calendar!
The timing ending up being a great choice in that it allowed two of my former students who were touring Japan (Abby & Tallulah) and our neighbor (Chris) to join us too! Yay for friend adventures!
Our synchronized itineraries had us meeting up in Tokyo at the Shinjuku station, but Shinjuku station is huge and with the girls' phones on overseas "wi-fi only" mode it was a little difficult to find each other initially. (How on earth people did this before GPS is sometimes beyond me!) But find each other we did, and off to Mt. Fuji we went!
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| We found each other! |
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| Train ride out of Tokyo |
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| One of the fun art posters on the train |
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| Busses continually carting people to & from the 5th Station |
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| Our path to the top |
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| Bright-eyed and ready to hike up this mountain, with our Fuji sticks in tow!
We started our trek around 1pm that afternoon. The trail begins surprisingly with a slight downhill (which encouraged a little more aggressive starting pace) and the scenery was stunning from the get-go. The mountain itself looked much greener than I thought it would, and the clouds protected us from the heat but didn't overly obscure our views.
Up we go!
Cloudy, but great visibility!
But after not too long the path turned into the steepness that was expected--and man, does the altitude get to you quickly! I'd like to think that I'm moderately in shape, but if you try to "bullet" your way to the top it's going to hurt pretty badly! So we slowed down a little and forced ourselves to take water & snack breaks as we made our way through the switch backs and up the mountain.
Much of the trail is a steady incline on rocky and often loose lava rock, while other parts (like the picture below) require a more vertical climb up a more solid rock face. In these stretches I found myself relying on my walking stick for balance and often using my hands to crawl my way up.
One of many rocky trail portions
As I mentioned earlier, the Fuji walking sticks are souvenirs as well as hiking aids and that is because of the different stamps you can get along the way. There are mountain huts along the trail where you can use the restroom and buy drinks & snacks--and almost all of them have a unique stamp that they will burn onto your walking stick for around 300 yen. We made it our personal mission to not only make it to the top, but to also collect all of the stamps that we could!
 
Burning the stamp onto our sticks
Stamps! Gotta catch 'em all!
We continued up through the day, eventually climbing above even the cloud line! It was incredible to be able to look out and not only see how far we had come but also the expansive countryside! We finally reached Gansomuro (the 8th Station hut where we would be spending the night) around 7pm. We had been hiking for about 6 hours at this point and were definitely ready for a break and some hot food as it was getting much colder on the mountain the later it got and the higher up we climbed! The sun was setting on the other side of the mountain so we had to take some photos first though :)
   
Sunset light at the 8th Station
The inside of the Gansomuro hut had an open area downstairs for eating/hanging out/getting ready in the morning; the upstairs area was divided into open two tiers meant entirely for just sleeping. All of the sleeping bags on the tiered levels were lined up sardine-style with very little room to move around, but at least our group was all lumped together! We got all settled in, and went downstairs for dinner--curry rice with chicken and some hot tea that really hit the spot! After dinner we all tried to sleep; it was pretty difficult for a number of reasons (being scrunched together, the snoring/noises of the people around us, being excited & in a new place, etc.) but we all got a little rest and I think our bodies thanked us for it. 
Dinner time
Close sleeping quarters
We got up at the whole cabin wake up call (~1:45am!), put all our cold weather gear and our headlamps on, and started up the dark mountain trail once again. It was MUCH colder now, making even gloved fingers cold, but our goal was upon us--make it to the top before sunrise! So on we went. Except that there were a ton of people who had the exact same goal and they all seemed to be moving slowly (or sometimes not at all) on the trail ahead of us, causing us to walk stop-and-go much of the way to the top. The paths were dark & narrow, and even with headlamps you didn't want to go too far off of the trail, so we trudged along with the rest of them. As we inched closer to the top, the first bits of sunlight could be seen on the horizon--causing many (including us) to have a greater sense of urgency to reach the summit in time. Unfortunately this added stress made people move more aggressively where there was no room yet to move. It got bad enough that a guy knocked Abby over as he tried to get past her! But thankfully she wasn't hurt. Phew! That could have been really bad! 
Rows of headlamps on the trail behind us trying to beat the sun to the top
Outside the summit gate just before dawn breaks
At the summit gate--we made it! :D
We reached the summit around 4:20am; it had taken us over 2 hours to make the final ascent from the 8th station to the summit/10th station, but we made it!! And with some time to spare! The top was already crowded with people so we stood back a ways, up on the steps of the summit shrine, and watched as The Land of the Rising Sun showed us exactly why it merits that name. 
Pre-sunrise view from the summit
Here comes the sun
Good morning! Ohayō gozaimasu!
As if the moment could be any more special, right after the sun had completely risen off of the horizon the Japanese national anthem started playing as they raised their flag high on the summit; and once the flag was at the top, we joined our voices in three resounding cheers of "banzai!", welcoming a new day and congratulating all who made it to the top to experience it. 
Banzai! Banzai! Banzai!
After soaking it all in, we got our coveted summit stamp--this one pounded on instead of burned, and made from lava rocks at the mountain top which gives it a red hue. This was followed by lots of staring at the magnificent scenery, photo taking, souvenir shopping, and some delightfully hot coffee and cocoa to take an edge off of the cold. 
Taking it all in
  
Cheers! Kanpai!
But the climb wasn't over quite yet... the true summit and highest peak of Fuji-san, called Kengamine, was on the other side of the cratered mountain top. To get there required another 30-45 minute walk around the top and included one final steep ascent on a path full of very loose gravel. There was no stamp to be gained at Kengamine, the peak housing only an unmanned weather station, but we all felt like we couldn't say we reached the top without going there. So we did. 3776 m (12,389 ft) above sea level! 
Still have some more to go
 
We couldn't have asked for better weather!
The crater we have to walk around--yes, that is still snow in the center!
Kengamine peak and its old weather station
One last steep incline to go
3776 meters--the tallest point in all of Japan!
We enjoyed every moment of being at the top, but we had to start going down so we could catch our bus back to Tokyo (we had enough insight after our trip out to the mountain to reserve bus seats for the way back). The trail down Fuji-san is completely different until it reconnects around the 6th station. It has switchbacks all the way down--they initially seem gradual and easier to handle than the rocky uphills, but their loose gravel made foot grip and control quite difficult at times. The gravel also kicked up a ton of dust! But luckily our hut had provided us with face masks to wear that kept a good amount of it out of our mouth and lungs. Chris & Tallulah made the (likely smarter) choice to jog most of the way down the paths, while the rest of us walked our way towards the bottom. Going down was definitely harder on our bodies than going up was! There were rolled ankles, really painful knees, and a couple of us fell down hard once or twice. 
Our steep path down, with a beautiful view
But make it down the mountain we did, even with Chris and I taking a short detour to get one final stamp that we had missed on the way up (go big or go home!). We were tired and sore, but oh so happy that we did it. Climbing Mt. Fuji is definitely something I will never forget and I'm really glad we were able to do it with such fun friends! 
Making sure we got that final missing stamp!
Our "after" photo--still smiling :)
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