Our forty hours of Mount Fuji

A quiet night in Kawaguchiko was about to get interesting. 

I was standing alone in front of a four-person taxi line outside the closed Kawaguchiko train station. It was nearly silent by 8:30 p.m. in the vacant town square, Chris and Timm had wandered off in search of help, strong gusts of warm wind were pushing through and lighting flashed in the distance, each one a little closer than the last.

This was not what I had crafted in our plan.

We had ridden four trains up from Yokosuka through Toyko that Friday afternoon, through one thunderstorm and a close call on making a transfer, to find that our connecting bus to the Fifth Station of Mount Fuji was canceled that night. The only other option, we were told by some Japanese hikers who shared our idea to summit overnight and enjoy sunrise on Fuji-san, was a taxi. A $110 taxi, that is, to set up a potential date with a thunderstorm on the rocky, steep, and likely slippery trail crossing the exposed face of a 12,388-foot volcano.

It wasn't, by anyone's judgment, a good plan.

So when Chris and Timm returned to the taxi stop and said they had been told about a nearby hostel with potential vacancies, I was an easy sell. We needed to at least check our options, and tear up my plan if needed. We walked down a dimly lit block from the station to the hostel, and a young woman was tending the desk. She had one room available, coincidentally enough, with three mats. And whether we needed another gentle tap on the shoulder or not, the heavens opened up at that moment and the Kawaguchiko street was filled with inches of water in minutes. A quick look at one another, and we turned back to the woman at the counter: "We'll take it."

The next morning, rested from a night's sleep on three mats rolled out side by side on the tatami-mat floor, Timm and I, with Chris Peterson, a Tokyo transplant friend of ours from North Park who we'd talked into joining us for a hike, caught the 6:40 a.m. Fifth Station bus under lovely, partly cloudy skies. The new plan was going off without a hitch.

We were going to hike Mount Fuji.

A beautiful new plan for our day.

We had read that all Japanese citizens hike Mt. Fuji at some point in their lives. There's even a saying for it: Anyone who does not climb Mount Fuji is a fool.

Kawaguchiko Fifth Station. There are bathrooms, restaurants, and
a store to stock up on anything you forgot before leaving. 

And on the hill we saw a broad cross section of the country, from children as young as four or five to  elderly to teenagers in jeans to religious groups on pilgrimage to large guided trips with the latest, and most colorful, in high-end hiking gear.

But those walks of life all have a different pace, which you need. Mt. Fuji is not easy, nor beautiful. After a few hundred yards of an even and tree-lined path leaving Fifth Station on the Subaru Line/Yoshida Trail (there are four different starting points and routes), the trail is a numbing slog uphill that gains 1,400 meters of elevation over about 6 kilometers of rocky outcrops and short, repetitive switchbacks over a mostly blank, volcanic-rock canvas.

Our afternoon on the moon. 

That's why the phrase I used above has a second part: But only the foolish climb Mount Fuji more than once. 

It is a beautiful experience, however. Though not a hike I'd describe as enjoyable in the sense of appreciating trees or riverbeds or wildlife, it is a hike I would not have missed for anything when visiting Japan. The climb, during which we shimmied past hundreds of hikers during the three hours it took the three of us to summit, was exhilarating and challenged our leg strength. It's a battle of will to just keep putting a foot in front of the other and keep your balance. The huts at each station (Fifth through Ninth as you move up) are a wonderful melting pot of hikers resting, sleeping and eating before starting their next leg. Each was a place much more friendly than the crowded streets of Tokyo or the Ginza Line. And the summit, which we reached during a partial clearing and enjoyed for just a few minutes before rain and hail moved in, was breathtaking in its view and thin oxygen level.

As you can see here.

Subaru Line heading out from Fifth Station early in the morning.

Looking down at Lake Kawaguchi and surrounding hills,
from just before Sixth Station. 

Timm and Chris Peterson head up the trail. 

Looking up the mountain as we cleared the tree line. Note the
little hikers. It's very easy to spot the trail because there's
a constant movement of people who only look like colorful ants. 

Photo op at Sixth Station.

Straight, simply straight, uphill at some parts.

View of the valley from a little higher altitude.

One of the huts that line the Yoshida Trail to the top. At each station
there are a series of huts, stacked nearly one on top of another (some maps I saw
listed stations in ".5". There were usually benches on one side, with the huts built
against the mountainside. Hikers can sleep inside and get a meal, we were told
it was about $50 U.S. to do that for a few hours overnight. It was about 100 yen
to use a bathroom, but that price increased to 200 yen per pee-pee by the top.

Looking down on the top of a hut, with switchbacks
in the background. Note the structures built to prevent erosion.
With the loose volcanic rock and soil, it seemed
really easy for the mountain to simple slide away,
particularly with the hundreds (thousands?) of hikers going
up and down each day and the wind whipping across the path. 

The color line. We went through one or two rainy sections
both going up and on the descent. When everyone got geared
up, it was like a rain jacket rainbow lining the trail.

A statue greeting you to the Okumiya Shrine, just below the summit. 

Looking back at the shrine's gates as the clouds roll in. We made it!

Erosion control at the Mt. Fuji summit. 

Chris and Timm take in the view on the rim of Mt. Fuji's crater.

Looking into the crater, where some snow was still standing.

A group arrives at the summit. The house barely visible in
the background is the hut at the top.

Timm enjoys a snack on top; Chris gets cell service! 

Pilgrims walk the crater's edge. This group came up on us from a small
shrine kind of hidden in a rock outcrop. They were chanting, almost singing verses as they walked, repeating the same chorus. Mount Fuji is a sacred place for many Japanese, which I'm glad this group honored among the throng of obvious tourists or foreigners.

Looking at the crater's edge as the clouds began to cover us. When
it started hailing, it was time to start hiking back down. 

Every age group was on the mountain. And this
little kid probably beat us down. We hustled up the mountain,
getting there in just three hours, which was tough but not too taxing.
But we meandered the way down. The Subaru Line has a separate
route for descent, and rather than a steep, rocky path, you descend on
loose, almost sandy volcanic soil, on long switchbacks that seem
to go on and on. I think the descent may have been more difficult for
me mentally, and we walked down for a little more than two hours. 

Kawaguchiko's Fifth Station on the return, where we waited for
our bus in another downpour. 

Although we ended the hike soaked (see above photo), summiting Mount Fuji was a wonderful experience, and especially special with Chris joining us. He moved his family to Tokyo in May and is exploring the country with his eyes wide open, and as the father of a 2-year-old and newborn, couldn't exactly justify this as a family trip. So hopefully Hannah, his wife, will get her own trek up the mountain with friends while Chris babysits sometime soon.

We rode down the mountain on the bus quietly, watching a line of cyclists climb the hill, wondering what the lower trail looked like. You can hike Stations 1-5, though it sounds like few do, despite the odds that the lower portion would probably be more enjoyable as a nature walk. We were tired, soaked, out of money (see that first post) and feeling our way back to Tokyo on a different train line that we came out on. We eventually made it, ambitious planning be damned, but praise be to travel flexibility.

Early in the week Timm had started calling this our trip's "40 Hour Day," because we weren't sure when we'd sleep with all the traveling and moving parts from Yokosuka to Kawaguchiko to Tokyo. The 40 straight hours of a Mount Fuji experience didn't come to pass. But finally sitting on the train, riding to our bed at 11 p.m. on Saturday after our 3 p.m. Friday departure, it kind of felt like we'd done even more than that.