Jacob-san vs. Fuji-san

Before I get too far into this entry I want to explain that I’m going to jump a little out of sequence here in terms of my adventures in Japan thus far. This weekend was quite a momentous occasion, so I want to get it down before it loses its freshness.

This past weekend here in Japan represents a holiday that they call “Obon” and it represents a time of reflection upon one’s ancestors. The Japanese people believe that during this time of the year, the spirits of their ancestors return to the household to spend time with the family they have left. Many people return home at this time to be with their families. For the rest of us it just meant a long weekend.

Because we had the extra time off, my good friend Christian and I decided that it would be the perfect time for a visit, and also to attempt an epic adventure. As I described in earlier posts, I had gone to visit him, but this was his first time seeing my home or even this part of Japan. I can’t believe that two months have already gone by since I was in Himeji. It blows my mind.

Saturday morning I woke up ridiculously early in anticipation of his arrival, cleaned up my pigsty and walked down to the station at 10 a.m. to pick him up. When he stepped off the train the first thing we did after a hearty hug was to commiserate about our lack of sleep. Neither of us had really gotten any rest the night before. We were understandably excited. After showing him around “downtown” Fukuroi, which you would find quite ironic if you ever get the chance to see it (why would you want to?) we stopped by my apartment for some relaxation and gift exchange. Being big music fans we both had plenty of music to trade each other, as well as him having brought some of my CDs back and some new books for me to read. I also was very grateful for him having brought his hair clippers, for I needed a cut in the worst way. Christian was so exhausted that after a couple of hours hanging out he absolutely needed to take a nap, so I let him get a few hours before we went out to dinner. My friend Keiko picked us up and we went for katsudon, which is pork cutlet topped with egg. Delicious.

As we were leaving the restaurant it began to rain so we decided to nix our plans to head down to Hamamatsu, the big city nearby, to go clubbing, and instead we just came back here to my apartment and watched a movie before crashing unbelievably hard. Not only were we tired, but we needed to get as much rest as we could before the next day’s impending ordeal. We made a quick stop at Keiko’s house where she picked up a pair of walking sticks from a previous climb of hers to lend us. Getting back to my place, we were asleep by about 11 p.m. so that we could get a good 12 hours sleep before attempting what was to be one of the greatest accomplishments of both of our lives: climbing Mt. Fuji.

The next morning, we woke up and upon conferring with Keiko, she told us that she would be more than happy to drive us to the city of Gotemba, where we were to pick up the bus to the mountain. It was very gracious of her, and of course we accepted her offer gladly. After a brief stop for food and at the shoe store so that I could pick up a pair of hiking boots we were on our way. The drive itself was easy as pie, having left Fukuroi at around 2 p.m. we arrived at the bus station in Gotemba at 3:30 p.m. Keiko dropped us off, bid us farewell and good luck and then left us teeming full of smiles and anticipation. Up to this point we had not yet seen the mountain itself, even though we were less than an hour away because of the cloud cover in the area that day. The bus left Gotemba at 4 p.m. and we were on our way. Christian and I had the bus to ourselves. Halfway through the ride the bus pulled over at the side of the road for some reason we couldn’t at first discern. Then we looked behind us and up the hill towards the bus were running two gaikokujin (foreigners) who had gotten on the wrong bus at the station. Upon returning to our seats the new arrivals coincidentally recognized Christian, turning out to be two of our fellow employees with Peppy! Japan may not be the biggest country, (about the size of California,) but it’s truly a small place when you are a foreigner.

A couple of quick facts about Mt. Fuji:

Mt. Fuji at it’s peak has an elevation of 3776 meters above sea level. Climbing season is the months of July and August, when thousands of people ascend and descend its various paths. It is indeed a volcano, but long at rest. There are four climbing trails available to use, spanning from the north face to the south face with one path due east and one south-east. Most climbers start at one of what are called “5^th stations” which vary in height depending on the path. At the peak is the 10^th station, over three and a half kilometers above sea level.

We arrived at Gotembaguchi at 5 p.m. This is the 5^th station along the Gotemba trail, the south-east path up the mountain. We are now 1400 meters up. After getting our gear adjusted and taking a few quick photos we were on our way. Immediately we were awed by the height; not only from the place at which we stood, but this was our first look at the peak. And truth be told we couldn’t even see it because it was still wrapped in clouds.

It’s the middle of the afternoon in Japan in the summer. Even if you are halfway up a mountain it is hot outside. After an hour of climbing I had developed a lovely “knapsack sweat line” which you can see in my online photo album (link on the right side of this page under “Links”.) At this point there were still many people around us, either ahead or behind us attempting the ascent, or others coming down the descending path. The path itself was made up of loose, pebbly black volcanic rock which was fairly easy on our feet, but wasn’t the most helpful in terms of speed; each step we took we slid back half a step, slowing our upward motion by half.

I would say it was perhaps 2 or 3 hours in before we got high enough for it to get cold. We took several rests to take pictures or take a swig of water, but made steady progress for quite a good while. At the previous station we had read that it would be roughly a 4 hour climb before reaching the next rest station. Our intention was to get there, get a bite to eat, get changed and get warm. By this time we quite far up, and the scenery was absolutely amazing. We could look behind us and see fields, cities and mountains in the distance all surrounded by clouds easily far lower than ourselves at that point. Christian mentioned how glorious the lack of civilization sounded; other than the wind it was completely silent on the side of that mountain. Before we got to the 7^th station we watched the light bleed out of the sky as the sun set behind the mountain, leaving us bathed for a short time in lovely blues, pinks and reds.

We arrived to our first disappointment at the 7^th station. The lights were out, and we found out that unless we wanted to sleep that we were out of luck in terms of getting food or having a warm place to rest. There was nothing we could do, so we sat down on the benches outside and got changed into our heavier clothes. We took about half an hour’s rest before shouldering our bags and heading onward and upward. At the 8^th station we were lucky enough to have caught the station ward awake and hospitable. I’d say this was about 6 or 7 hours into our climb. For about four dollars apiece we each got a cup of the worst coffee we’ve ever had. At that point it was worth every penny, even just for us to be inside out of the cold and the wind. But again we were disappointed by the lack of food, so we asked the ward, and he informed us that there should be food being served at the next station. So we took another 20 minutes rest here and then were on our way again.

Now, I don’t want you to get your hopes up like I did, but we didn’t find something to eat until 6 a.m. But I’m jumping ahead. The trail had become more difficult at this point. We had left the gravelly path some time ago, and now everything was rocky and we had to start choosing each step carefully. Any real physical pain from the start of the climb, my aching legs, ankles, feet and shoulders had disappeared, but instead we were faced with what became a much tougher battle: altitude. At this point we must have been somewhere close to 2800 or 3000 meters above sea level. So it’s cold, dark and we’re hungry. We continue to pick our way amongst the rocks, leaning heavily on our walking sticks and concentrating on our breathing so as to not get sick. It’s a real concern at that height, I can verify, because I was dizzy at many points, and also close to throwing up once or twice. Another thing I noticed was that after climbing upwards and leaning forward for such a long time, my equilibrium was off-balance, causing me to have trouble looking back down the mountain for fear that I would start tumbling head over heels. The rests had to get more frequent and we had to move slower if we were going to get anywhere further, so this is exactly what we did.

As we were ascending the most incredible things were going on both below and above us. We would be climbing and we would hear these great cracks of noise in the distance. At first we thought it was thunder in the surrounding clouds. Once the sun had set completely we could see that below us, to the south-east, there were magnificent flares appearing from within the surrounding woods. Four beats from what must have been giant drums would be hammered out and then four flares would appear in a circle. It was simultaneously confusing and magical. Graciously, the sky had also cleared, and the stars shone down on us and bathed us in ethereal light. Upon taking a rest at some point I happened to glance up into the sky and noticed a shooting star. Then they were all around us. Talk about magic. It was at this point I was convinced of how close to nature we had gotten; the clouds surrounding, the stars above, the land unfolding below and the mountain itself came together in a symphony that could not be ignored.

Upon arrival at the 9^th station we were far from surprised that it was closed, but very disappointed. We were hungry and tired so we bitterly began to curse the mountain, calling it “Shama-yama” because each supposed “rest stop” turned out to be anything but restful. I remember saying something like: “What a sham! I didn’t pay NO money to climb this sucker and not get fed along the way!” So you can see that even though we were cold, hungry and tired, we still managed to keep our senses of humor. We must have been about 3400 meters above sea level now. We started to get increasingly cold, so we finally brought out our jackets. Sitting by the shanty that I suppose must have been the 9^th station, Christian and I found a spot safe from the chilly blasts and sat down for a good rest. The valley below us was beautiful in a way I could never fully describe. It was full dark out now, but we could make out the lights from the towns far below us, and the valley stretching out until we lost it in cloud cover. In the distance smaller mountains loomed in every direction, shrouded in thick clouds, and I finally understood the inspiration for many of the murals I had seen painted on the walls of the ancient castles. This is truly a land of green, rolling mountains and thick, billowy clouds as far as one can see, and if you ever get a chance to see these paintings, (or climb Fuji,) you will see exactly what I mean.

Once we saw the sign that told us we had an hour to go until the summit, regardless of our lack of oxygen, we were incredibly excited. It was a difficult combination at the time, seeing as how the whole journey was leading us to this very point and yet every step we took became more and more difficult. At this altitude we were also no longer disparate from the clouds, we were in them. The beam of the flashlight extended no farther than 15 feet from us. And it this point the climb became especially hazardous because the path was not well-marked in some places, and a few times we nearly strayed into the mist.

We knew that the summit was nearing, even though all we could make out was one darker shapeless blob of black against a sky only a shade lighter. In fact, it was almost upon us before we knew it when out of the clouds Christian spotted a “torii” (gate-post) and we knew we had arrived. We walked under the gate at the same time, and breathed a sight of relief, albeit a short-breathed one. We had arrived at 3 a.m., meaning that it had taken us roughly 10 hours to scale the mountain, and we were still about an hour and a half early for the sunrise.

It was still impossible to make out any details of the terrain around us because of the clouds so we began to pick our way around to see if we could find some shelter or food or even other people. We found a path that led to a series of buildings, and although we did find people shelter and food were not to be found. Everyone was huddling in doorways or anywhere else they could to get out of the wind. It was absolutely frigid by this point, and Christian and I had no choice but to find someplace we could sit and wait out the sunrise. We found our way back to the top of the Gotemba trail and huddled down beside the building there, ending up having to hold each other just to keep warm. There was no way we were going to be able to sleep, so upon Christian’s suggestion we got up and found our way to the highest peak on the eastern edge of the crater. Luckily there was a small rock pile at the top that we huddled in front of, not that it helped much. By the time we had sat down the sky was visibly lighter, and more and more people began to stream up to the peak and join us.

Of course there is no way to explain the glory of a sunrise from the top of a mountain. You can take a look at some of the pictures we took, but of course this does the experience no justice. Sufficed to say, we were very pleased to have come all that way and gone through so much to see something so beautiful. On the other hand, we were exhausted, freezing and starving, so we took some time to get some good pictures of the valleys below, the clouds as they melted red and gold and the view from the peak down into the crater before packing up and heading down to the buildings below. We found our way directly to the cafeteria and got ourselves the most expensive cup of coffee and bowl of soup I’ve ever seen, but I would have paid double what I did at that point. After gobbling that down we gave ourselves 30 minutes just sitting down on the stools in there before we got up to decide what our next move was going to be. Once we got outside we could see that there would be nowhere to get comfortable enough to sleep for a few hours so we re-slung our bags, said goodbye to the other Peppy teachers that we had met again at the summit and started out on the journey back down the mountain. It was then 6:30 a.m.

I really don’t want to go into too much detail about the climb back down. We chose the shortest path down, but what we didn’t expect was the amount of traffic in both directions and the rockiness of the trail. The Gotemba trail, the one we ascended was supposed to be 7-10 hours up and 5-7 down, and the Fujinomiya trail was only supposed to be 2-4 hours down. For us it turned out to be about 4 and a half of the most grueling and painful hours imaginable. By the time we reached the bottom our feet had given up. Mine were screaming murder at me, threatening to give up altogether. Our necks, shoulders, thighs, knees, calves, ankles, feet and toes were all throbbing. It was heaven once we finally reached pavement and level ground. We found our way to the bus stop and hopped on the first bus to Fuji city; it was a two hour drive that gave us our first taste of sleep in 24 hours. And it was glorious.

Once we arrived at the station we called up Keiko who we had previously arranged to meet. She came and picked us up, and had even bought us fresh t-shirts and socks! We had warned her to expect two exhausted and stinky boys, so she came prepared. We drove about an hour or so to the town of Hakone where we went to what would be best described as a water park. In Japan one of the most popular forms of recreation is going to an “onsen” which is a natural hot spring. This wasn’t quite the same in that it was basically a hot spring amusement park. There were many different kinds of baths including flavored baths like coffee, flower essence, green tea, red wine and sake. Regardless of how tacky and artificial the atmosphere, it was heaven on earth to soak ourselves and rest our bodies after the previous day and night’s ordeal.

On the way back Christian and I understandably both passed out in the car. Keiko woke us up once we were back in Fukuroi. We stopped for a quick bite at a local sushi restaurant and then came right home to crash. I don’t know if I can say I really slept much in the car on the way home so at this point I was going on 36 hours without sleep. We both feel deep asleep and woke up about 12 hours later feeling unbelievably sore. By now the pain was alright though, because we had had a chance to rest and get a little perspective on what we had just accomplished. We’d been on the roof of the world! Or the roof of Japan at least. I don’t think I have ever gone through something more physically trying in my life, and I don’t discount the mental challenge either. Pride was definitely abound when we awoke, got ourselves together and headed down to the train station to go to Hamamatsu where I would be showing Christian around for a few hours before he was to return home to Himeji. Unfortunately we arrived too late to take a tour of the Musical Instrument Museum, but we did manage to check out a few key shops in the downtown area and stop for some delicious Indian food. After that there was nothing left but to see Christian off at the Shinkansen station and then head home as well.

This was definitely one for the books. An adventure of a lifetime. How many more clichés can I spout? Probably too many. It was something that I know will give some shape to my life, something that I am very proud of and can carry with me always, at least in memory. The physical pain and trial endured was nothing compared to the beauty that I experienced and the strength that I gained as a result. Thank you Christian for sharing that with me. I’m glad we had a chance to complete an ordeal so epic and representative of Japan during our time here. For everyone else, I hope you enjoyed the read somewhere close to as much as I enjoyed the living and the telling. Check out my photo album for updated pictures, both of the trip to Mt. Fuji and of my apartment. And keep those emails coming… I love em!

Lots of love to all… wherever and whenever,

Jacob