Mt. Fuji or Bust

- or -

How I Climbed Mt. Fuji in 8 Hours One Night

July 9th & 10th, 1999

8:00 pm - We started at the 5th station at 8 pm, which is about 8,000 feet. There are 10 stations from the foot to the peak, ostensibly equally spaced up the mountain. We drove to the end of the Subaru Line (a toll road) and parked at the end of the road at the large tourist complex parking lot of the 5th station. The sun had just set and it was getting dark. By the time we started it was dark, the station was closed down except for vending machines, and no water was available. So we hit up the vending machines for water and batteries (for our headlamps). The water was 200 yen (about $2), and, as we soon found out, the price went up as you went higher on the mountain.

11:00 pm - We moved along quite well at first. In the picture above, we have been moving about 3 hours, but then our lungs were still ok with the level of oxygen. The top is a mere 12,390 feet, so just 3,400 vertical feet to go. Already, I'm very glad I got the trekking poles. At the pace we are traveling, I'm a little concerned that we will get up to the top too soon and freeze during the last two hours of inactivity waiting for sunrise. As it developed, I needn't have worried.

There were huts every so often where you could buy drinks and snacks, etc. You could always hear them by their generators, and see their lights, like night skiing, but not close enough together to avoid the flashlight. We were on schedule for arriving at the top just before sunrise, so as we got to each hut, it seemed like a flood of people joined us on the trail. Being at the top at sunrise is a very special thing to the Japanese. So they hike up in the afternoon to an intermediate point and sleep until early morning. There are four trails up Mt. Fuji. On advice of the people in the iJKK office we went up from Kawaguchiko (North side of the mountain). The advantage of this is that the trail quickly traverses to the east side of the mountain, where you are always in a good position to watch the sunrise, even if you fall behind the pace. (In fact, when the top is obscured in clouds, I'm told that sunrise is better from lower down, like the eighth station.)

Sunrise looking East from the top of Mt. Fuji at 4:30 am.
The views – astounding. This is what its all about!

About 7:30 am, looking down the mountain as people continue to complete their ascent. The trekking poles that Ed is leaning on were worth every penny we paid for them – especially for the down trip. Yes, that is exactly the same kind of lava rock you put in the bottom of your barbeque grill, and the loose stuff was pretty treacherous footing.

The Japanese love of high tech was everywhere apparent in their gear and clothing, as were their impecable manners. Everyone would share a "Konbanwa" (good evening), or "Ohayo gozaimashita" (good morning – literally, it's early), or, as it soon became abbreviated from either lack of originality or lack of oxygen, "Gozaimashita". The hand-hewn steps I had envisioned were mostly non-existent, although the trail is punctuated with concrete steps just preceding each hut (usually 30 to 50), and with runoff abatement steps of wire-screen and gravel at the switchbacks (usually just one big one – with one, 12" step that seemed to get higher as the night wore on). The trail we were on was actually two one-way trails, one up, one down. Parts of the up trail was across broken lava flows which were hard to navigate and irregular in the height you had to step. Well at least it was dark so it was easy to break a leg or something (ha ha). In places it seemed as much rock-scrambling as it was hiking. The headlamps turned out to be a great idea, as we had both hands free to work the trekking poles or grab on. Some of the small groups going up had cyalume light sticks on their backpacks which helped them stay together (good visual clue of where your buddies were). The tour groups had walkie-talkies and the red, flashing bike lights at the head and tail of their column. The half-light of pre-dawn made it easier to navigate, but that paled to the welcome realization that we were on the last set of steps preceding station ten. Not quite dawn yet, and we made it!

4:30 am - Everyone is facing east watching the sun rise over the clouds on the horizon. With the break of the first eye-stabbing rays, the speakers behind us start playing a tinny version of the Japanese National Anthem. Everyone around us is exuberant, taking pictures, in high spirits and, in general, relishing the moment.

5:00 am - Breakfast was a very pricey bowl of Udon noodles (800 Yen), for which we got the benefit of getting to crash on the mats at the souvenir shop where we bought it.

7:30 am - After a quick 2 hour nap, it was time to head back down. The trip back down was almost as hard because the descending trail is so steep. It took us 8 hours up and 6 hours down, including rest breaks, and accommodations for the blisters and accumulated sores and fatigue. The vistas in the daylight were phenomenal – what with all the green, and mountains and forests and cities gleaming in the distance. Mt. Fuji seems to be twice as high as the other mountains around it.

1:30 pm - Back to the bottom (5th Station) again. We lived to tell. Then cruelty at the end of the trek: the restaurant, and lunch, is up a long flight of stairs, and the legs just won't put up with it.

Well, that was our trip. Glad I did it. Glad its over. Glad I don't have to do it again.

I now understand well the Japanese adage:

Its a wise man who climbs Mt. Fuji,
but only a fool would do it twice.