Most travel guides insist on trying to sell a place and its related services and delights to you. With no corporate sponsorship, and two very sore calf muscles, I have the absolute opposite intention.
Friends, I am here today to convince you that climbing Mount Fuji, the enigmatic and exotic symbol of Japan, is about the worst decision an English-speaker such as yourself can make. Why, might you ask?
Ha-ha, well let me tell you why.
Perhaps you have had a conversation like this.
Idiot Friend A: I like hiking.
Idiot Friend B: Say, me too! Howzabout a hike someday?
Idiot Friend A: Why that’s the best idea I’ve ever heard! But… where?
Idiot Friend B: Hmm, you ask one tough question there buster. Some place exciting, dynamic… some place… I’ve got it!
Idiot Friend A: Where? WHERE IS IT?
Idiot Friend B: Think exotic. Think Far East. Think snow-capped and volcanic!
Idiot Friend A: Say, you’re not talking about Mount Fuji, are ya?
Idiot Friend B: You took the words right outta my mouth! Mt. Fuji!
Idiot Friend A: That’s brilliant, yeah, brilliant! Let’s hike Mt. Fuji!
And off our two friends go, happy as can be.
Little do they know what they’re in for.
You see, I was friend A. And I had a couple of friend B’s and even a girlfriend C (we’ll get to her later). My friend B’s and I got the notion that we should hike Mt. Fuji. What a thought! It’s so famous, a national symbol, a world-renowned mountain. It’s everything I’ve ever wanted to set foot on!
So, doing as idiot friends do, we all hatched our plan to “hike” Mt. Fuji. The problem is, you can’t really hike it. You have to climb it. And climbing is about as different from hiking as Zimbabwe is from calculus. That’s right – they’re not even related.
Hiking is a pleasurable activity where smiling, healthy people put on clothing from outdoor mail-order catalogs and pretend to love the great outdoors for a limited amount of time. The trails are nicely kept, the scenery is beautiful, and with any luck, the weather is quite pleasant. Hiking is something most anyone with the capability to move their body can do.
Climbing a mountain is not. Climbing a mountain involves equipment, dangers and risks, altitudes, questionable weather, and the occasional Liger (mythological half lion, half tiger that is said to reside on the slopes of Mt. Fuji.) It does not include smiles. In fact, smiling is not allowed by mountain law after climbing for more than two hours. Any smiling after said time limit will be punished to the full extent of aforementioned mountain law.
And we certainly paid our penance.
According to non-Japanese bloggers, Japanese people have a saying that essentially states one would be a fool never to hike Mt. Fuji, but also a fool to hike it twice. No Japanese acquaintance of mine reiterated such a saying. Instead, they simply looked surprised when I mentioned my casual interest in the mystical mountain.
“You’re going to climb Mt. Fuji? Sugoi! (Amazing!) It’s really hard!”
“Ha-ha, I heard so. But it’ll be a good experience. I can’t wait!”
This continued unabated for weeks.
“What are you doing for your vacation?”
“I’m going to climb Mt. Fuji?”
“I’m sorry, what?”
“Mt. Fuji!”
“What! Really?”
“Yeah, it’ll be fun!”
Over and over again I said this until I had nearly convinced myself that such an activity would truly be a fun, worthwhile, and quite attainable experience.
Sadly, internal misgivings and a sense of impending doom like to go bump in the night.
Two days before our idiot friend fiesta on Mt. Fuji, I started to worry. How tall was Mt. Fuji anyway? Is there a trail? How many people will be there? Is it difficult? What do I need? Am I prepared?
I did my research, read lots of blogs and official Japanese websites, and brought everything suggested, except for a can of compressed oxygen, which I would purchase on the mountain. With winter clothes, some idea of the mountain course, and my trusty running shoes, I knew I had this mountain by the… rocks. My idiot friend B’s felt the same.
But poor girlfriend C wasn’t quite on the same page. In fact, she hadn’t looked well beyond the cover and thought she already knew the entire contents.
The night before the hike, Japanese girlfriend C and her family and I sat down for a nice barbeque. And as the meat and vegetables sizzled and burned, so did all the preconceived notions of a simple country girl.
“So where will I wash my face?”
“Wash your face? You want to wash your face during the climb?”
“Well, yes. And I want to brush my teeth. And where are we sleeping?”
“We’re not sleeping.”
Sizzle.
“We’re not sleeping!? You mean we’re climbing all night?”
“Yes, that’s how we’ll see the sunrise at the top.”
“But aren’t we staying in a hotel?”
“What hotel?”
Crisp.
“On the mountain?”
“They’re just stations.”
“They have free beds, right?”
“Free? They’re sleeping bags, on the ground, and they cost 4000 yen a night.”
“What?!”
Burn.
And with all hopes of a nice walk in the volcanic, ash-covered, 3,776 meter (12,388 foot) tall park dashed in the hot embers of the night’s barbeque, we went off to bed, girlfriend C terrified, and idiot me concerned.
We awoke early the next day and caught the bullet train to Tokyo. In Shinjuku, Idiot Me, Idiot’s B1 and B2, and poor, pitiable Japanese girlfriend C missed our bus, and took a train to Kawaguchiko. It winded through beautiful, dramatic valleys carved out by a winding river in the bucolic Yamanashi prefecture. Yamanashi means mountain pear, owning to the fruit that is grown in the lush, verdant hills of the area. We switched trains in the middle of one of many green, grassy fields and enjoyed the world’s silliest set of train stations for the next hour. Each stop was so close to the last that one could probably have beaten the train on a tricycle. Eventually, after nearing a state of redundancy-induced mania, we arrived at Kawaguchiko, a picture-perfect tourist trap, where we enjoyed paying too much for a mediocre last supper before the ascent. We then stopped in the gift shop that had to be visited in order to exit the building and purchased our cans of oxygen. The man at the register tried to convince us to buy walking sticks as well, as they were cheaper there than on Mt. Fuji, but we resisted. Somehow carrying a six-foot, four-inch thick piece of wood up and down a mountain, only to bring it back through Tokyo, seemed sort of silly. And I still haven’t regretted not buying one.
Our bus arrived and we headed off to the fifth station of Mt. Fuji. The bus was filled with an international group of imbeciles ranging from Korean cretins to Chinese twits, Irish idiots to French fatheads, Japanese jackasses and our own North American nincompoop patrol. It was a fine cadre of fools, and we smiled all the way up, even as our chests started to tighten from the rising elevation.
Upon arrival at the fifth station, we changed from our summer clothes to warmer, rain-proof duds as recommended by several websites. And right they were, as the temperature was noticeably colder. After a quick stretch and a few photos, we headed off into the dark with flashlights in hand, thinking “Gee-whiz, this sure is gonna be fun!”
