Climbing Mount Fuji

Mt. Fuji (photo I took previously while riding the bullet train)

On July 13, 2013 I climbed to the top of Mount Fuji (富士山), along with two friends. This is something I've wanted to do for a long time and finally I got the chance this summer. Leading up to the day of the climb, I really didn't know what to expect. I read so many mixed accounts of others' experiences and when I mentioned it to Japanese colleagues and friends they reacted as if I had a tremendous challenge in front of me. Yet I always felt that as long as I prepared adequately it would be fairly straight forward and I wouldn't encounter any problems. Well, I'm happy to say that for the most part, this turned out to be an accurate assessment! Despite some pretty terrible weather at times, I thoroughly enjoyed the experience and hopefully I can describe it well here.

Preparation

Mt. Fuji is said to be one of the most climbed mountains in the world with over 100,000 people reaching the summit every year. Thus, it was easy to find lots of information about scaling the beautiful mountain. But I quickly realized that people's experiences were quite different and had little consistency between them. Some claimed that it was easy and could be done without much effort. Others insisted that it should not be taken lightly and extensive preparation and planning is critical before going. Thus, I assumed that my own experience would likely fall somewhere in the middle of these two extremes. I figured that preparation and carefully deciding what to bring would be the most important part in my planning. Here are the main items I brought:

My preparation for climbing Mt. Fuji

I started out wearing quick-dry hiking pants than can be converted to shorts and a lightweight quick-dry workout shirt as my base layer. For the coldest parts of the mountain, I also had Heat Tech long underwear which would go under my base layer. Additionally I brought several light jackets which could easily be put on or taken off. My top layer consisted of a high quality, waterproof, Gore-tex jacket and matching pants. I wore durable, comfortable hiking socks and waterproof, Merrell Gore-tex hiking shoes. I also had waterproof gloves. I brought a baseball cap for sunny/wet conditions and a beanie for the cold. I bought a wooden hiking stick for getting stamps along the way and I also had a headlamp for nighttime climbing. The backpack I used was my Osprey Manta (30L) hiking bag containing a built-in water bladder which I filled with about 3 liters of water. My bag also has a built-in rain cover, which was an essential item to have during the climb. I brought high-calorie, high carbohydrate foods, including 4 Snickers bars, 5 packs of Calorie Mates and 3 packs of protein jelly-drink. And of course to capture my amazing experience, I brought my Sony Nex-6 camera and an extra lens. So ultimately was this preparation adequate? Mostly yes, but as I will explain later, I underestimated how cold it would be at the summit; as a result I would have packed an additional set of real winter clothes if I were able to make one adjustment.

Getting Started

On the day of the climb, my friends and I left Tokyo around 10:00 A.M. Taking the highway bus, we arrived at the Mt. Fuji 5th Station via about 3 hours later. This is the most common starting point for climbing Mt. Fuji and it was packed that day. I immediately felt great excitement, as there were so many people preparing and getting set up to start their journey upward. I brought a wooden hiking stick from a shop, we snacked on some food, and then we put all of our gear on. By about 3:00 P.M., we were on our way up the Yoshida Trail. At that altitude, it was still very hot and we quickly started sweating our butts off even with the cloudy sky. So in somewhat humorous fashion, we had to immediately stop and take off half of the gear we had just put on until we were all down to shorts and t-shirts.

At Fuji 5th Station the summit looks deceptively close (don't let it fool you, it's quite far I promise)

On the Trail

The next few hours were a breeze, both literally and figuratively. It was cloudy, breezy, and misty. Early on, hiking on the trail was as simple as walking along it. It was wide enough for us to easily pass all the slow-pokes, just as well as to take short 5-minute breaks to snap photos, eat some snacks, and drink water. But a few hours later the mist turned into more of a drizzle. Then, the drizzle quickly became rain. And before long, it was pouring. The winds speeds increased as the temperatures dropped as well. Luckily, I was completely prepared for such weather as were my friends. We put on all of our waterproof gear and we continued ascending upwards.

Hiking on the trail that day, most people seemed well-prepared, but occasionally we'd see a few who looked as if they thought they could make it up with a light jacket and bottle of water. Right before the rain came down, a young man and women flew right by the three of us. The man only wore pants and a t-shirt with a camera slung behind his back. His girlfriend was carrying a small backpack. Not even an hour later when it was raining hard, we saw the same couple returning back down. Suffice to say, these sightings steadily decreased as climbed higher and as the weather became harsher. Here's a tip if you're planning to make the exhibition someday--don't be like those people.

Starting to rain more heavily

Up, Up, Up

Mid-way through the climb, the trail became a little more jagged and rough. The geography rapidly changed from green vegetation to dusty volcanic rock. Certain parts required traversing over small volcanic boulders and up steep make-shift stairs. But this never seemed like much of a challenge to me since they were rather short sections. However, the trail did continuously get narrower the higher we climbed, which meant there were human traffic jams periodically. Nonetheless, we trekked on, only taking short breaks along the way.

I had wondered how the high altitude might affect me. Some people experience altitude sickness from the thin air. Mt. Fuji may be less than half the size of Everest but it still rises up a substantial 3776 meters (12,388 ft). Luckily, I personally never experienced any altitude sickness during the climb. However, the air did feel different to me at the highest parts of the mountain. And at the time, I remember thinking that it must significantly inhibit some people; especially the elderly, heavy smokers, or those very overweight. Furthermore, I've read that altitude sickness can affect anyone, even if people that don't fall into any of these categories so I'm grateful that it didn't impact me in any real way.

Image by net_efekt, showing elevations of the world's tallest mountains (Mt. Fuji in pink)

As we reached the upper half of the mountain, the weather was still rainy and as the daylight faded and night came upon us, the wind grew much stronger and the temperatures plummeted further. Still, we were enthusiastic and having a good time!

Past the halfway point, the sun was retiring for the night we weren't about to by any means.

Nightfall

At this point, we saw fewer and fewer people continuing up the mountain. Many stopped at the various mountain huts located at the 7th and 8th stations to eat, rest, and sleep for awhile. Early in the trip planning we had read about these huts, but based on various sources, we determined that it was an unnecessary expense. So my friends and I didn't make any reservations for these huts and anticipated that we could instead just rest near the station for a few hours before the final ascent. But as it turned out, we simply agreed to keep going until we reached the summit. In fact, I think the longest break we took throughout the entire climb was 15 minutes.

The last hour of climbing before reaching the peak was definitely the hardest. Up there, the landscape is barren and unwelcoming. The night sky was deep black as the clouds blocked out the moon, and the weather was bitterly cold, rainy, and incredibly windy. In addition, we were admittedly quite tired by this point and I even managed to pull a muscle in my calf to make things worse. Yet, I didn't perceive this as the biggest challenge of my experience--that would come later. Finally, around 11:00 P.M., we made it to the top. Success! We had just climbed Mount Fuji!

At the Summit

Our quick celebration consisted of a few high fives and a quick look at the city lights far below. Then we turned our attention to finding a spot to hopefully sleep for a few hours before the sunrise. Surprisingly, there were no more than a dozen people up there at that time. The handful of people were resting beside a small wall of rock in an attempt to stay out of the nasty wind. We found a few open spaces and laid down. My friends were smart and brought sleeping bags while I just had some thin pads to sleep on. I thought that before catching some zzz's I would take some nice photos of the city lights, but the extreme wind and cold made this task literally impossible. I just ended up with lots of blurry photos and ice-cold hands. 

Right thereafter, I experienced the most difficult part of the entire trip. Returning to my spot by the rocks, I curled up and shut my eyes. Ten minutes later, it started to rain again, and I started to shiver. Then I started to shake from the serious cold and bastardly wind, and I realized it was going to be a long, rough night.

(Failed) attempt to sleep at the summit

My friends couldn't sleep either, even with their sleeping bags. It was just too cold. I got up and started walking because I really needed to warm up, when I spotted a better place to hold out for the night. One of my friends then followed me over and for the next four hours we sat side-by-side, in an upright position, with his sleeping back laying over us--still shivering but at least not shaking. For those four hours, we chatted about all sorts of things and we watched rare patches of sky open up time to time to reveal some beautiful stars. As the morning drew closer people started to stumble past us desperately looking for a warm place to where they could retreat. Then, by 3:00 A.M., the summit was starting to get crowded with people waiting for the sunrise. An hour later some of the little shops opened their doors and the three of us ran inside to seek refuge from the weather. In doing so we were obligated to buy some overpriced, flavorless, stale ramen but we were so cold it didn't matter. Just 20 minutes later we got word that the sun was about to come up so we bolted out of there and ran over towards the edge of the summit.

Sunrise

Just before sunrise, from summit of Mt. Fuji

This is what made everything worth it:

Sunrise, from the summit of Mt. Fuji

After waiting for what seemed like an eternity, the sun finally pierced through the cloud cover and poured its rays all over the landscape that laid below. It was enough time for me to capture the photo above (albeit enhanced) and for a few moments I was able to take my mind off of the frozen wasteland and really take in the incredible view. It's utterly impressive to see the earth from this perspective and is a reminder of how small we are in the grand scheme of things. I would have like to stay longer up there; all three of us wanted to hike around the mountain's caldera as well as send out postcards but the wind was dangerously strong and we were just too sleepy and exhausted from the brutal night. So as soon as the sunrise was over, we started back down.

Down, Down, Down

I can describe the descent very easily. Basically you have two options, either walk down behind herds of sleepy, slow people or skip and glide down using the loose volcanic path to your advantage. I opted for the second method, however my friends were admittedly a little less zealous than I was. It was also pretty funny to periodically see people literally running down. Anyway, is was significantly faster to return to the 5th station and we made it back around 9:00 A.M. My Mount Fuji trip was complete and it was a great success.

Line of people descending from the summit

I had heard so many different stories about climbing the famous mountain and now I had done it myself and seen it with my own eyes. And indeed, seeing the sunrise from the highest place in Japan was nothing short of amazing. But truthfully the whole experience was unforgettable and I enjoyed it immensely. I encourage everyone to try it someday, you won't regret it.