I could think of no better way to spend my Japanese 'Obon' summer holiday than attempting to scale the country's highest mountain. Despite carrying a knee injury that I'd picked up a couple of weeks ago, training Jiu-Jitsu, I was determined to make the climb. I'd read a lot of information both online and in guidebooks about how to get to Mount Fuji, but as always, none of it was quite as useful as simply asking people that work in the public transport industry. I was hoping to save money by avoiding the use of the Shinkansen (the famous bullet-train). However the timings for the trains that I was given by the staff in Nagoya were way out. So what would have taken only three hours, had I taken the Shinkansen, took nearly seven!As typhoon number four of the year (I hadn't even realised there had been a one, two or three this year and I've been here for most of it), swung in from the southwest on Wednesday, it was crucial that I constantly checked the weather reports for the area. It seemed that I would have a small window on Thursday night into Friday morning where the rain would hold off long enough to make the climb under good conditions. As most people attempt the climb during the night in order to avoid the heat of the sun and to watch the sun rise from the summit, I thought I'd do the same. By the time I had finally arrived into Fuji station it was about seven o'clock which I thought would be ideal given that I'd planned to begin climbing at about nine.
However when I arrived I was informed politely by another member of JR staff that I had missed the last bus out to the mountain. To take a taxi would have cost me 10,000 yen, and so it seemed that all the effort in trying to save money by taking the cheaper trains was now undone. I resigned myself to the fact that I was better off finding a cheap hotel for the night and getting the first bus out in the morning. I just had to hope that the weather wouldn't deteriorate, at least until Friday afternoon.
To be honest, I think it turned out for the best, climbing that night would have been extremely difficult as I was already exhausted from the calamitous train journey. So after a brief look around Fuji city and something to eat, I settled into my room at the Fuji Station Hotel. Everything about the hotel was basic, except for the toilet which seemed to have more buttons on it than the average computer keyboard. It reminded me of the 'Alan Partridge' line: "I'd feel like Buck Rogers taking a dump on that... in the twenty-first century".
The morning of Friday the thirteenth: I was up and out first thing to take yet another train ride over to Fuji-nomiya station where the first bus was leaving from. It was on this train that I caught my fist glimpse of the mighty Mount Fuji. After the ninety minute bus ride through the coniferous forests at the foot of the mountain I had finally reached the fifth station, the starting point for most climbers, at 2400 metres above sea-level.
At the beginning...
Now for most people with an average fitness level, the ascent from the fifth station to the summit at 3776 metres should take around six hours. Of course those of you who know me well, will know that in my head, I was saying "but I am no average man!" And so I set off at a blistering pace, deciding that I would rest every hour for about five to ten minutes to take on water, jelly beans and just enjoy the scenery a little. I could see that my relative speed was impressing some of the other climbers and this only spurred me on to go even faster. I would pay for this later.
They start 'em young...
I reached the summit in just under three hours. I then decided to descend into the crater (Mount Fuji is still a volcano after all) to have lunch, which consisted of a packet of mixed nuts. It was here in the crater where the most bizarre and at the same time, wonderful event occurred. I met a young lad called Yuuki who had brought a football with him up the mountain and together we proceeded to have an impromptu kick around in the middle of a volcanic crater.
After the small success that the Japanese had at this year's World Cup they're obviously stepping up the intensity of training at grass roots, making kids climb Mount Fuji before practicing free-kicks on the rocky surface of the crater is hardcore. Anyway after leaving Yuuki alone to practice his free-kicks, I headed back around the perimeter of the crater to begin making my decsent.
Now as I've already mentioned I had climbed the mountain quite quickly and of course, I had seen some people inhailing from aerosol cans of 100% oxygen, but I had thought these to be of little use. I figured that I wouldn't feel the effects of altitude because of my level of fitness and that I would have to go up to at least 8000 metres. However this was a very poorly conceived notion as almost any doctor will tell you it's not about how high you go, but how fast you do it. See -www.traveldoctor.co.uk/altitude.htm.
My descent became an extremely miserable affair, I had a terrible headache, nausia and the temperature had dropped considerably. I was prepared for the cold, but it was still really hard to regulate my body temperature because I had sweat so much on the way up. I was slow and felt a little delirious coming down until between the 7th and 6th stations, I dropped to all fours and vomitted on the side of the mountain. So much for the jelly beans and mixed nuts.
After this however, I felt much better and was able to resume a good pace to get down off the mountain. It wasn't the end of my suffering though. I had decided that for the price it had cost to stay a night in Fuji city, it made more sense to head straight home and at take my inaugural Shinkansen ride. However I was still having difficulty regulating my body temperature and was finding that I was needing to drink a lot of water. Then I discovered that my skin was feeling particularly sensitive and realised that my lack of preparation in the sunscreen department was being brought into question. I'm currently writing this with lobster coloured arms from below the shoulder, legs from below the knee, neck and face.
At the end.
So in conclusion ladies and gentlemen, I do thoroughly recommend a climb up Mount Fuji, you could just be a little better prepared than I was, and please do take the altitude sickness seriously, it's not a nice feeling. However the views were stunning, the people fantastic and it's been without doubt the 'high'light (that was an awful pun, I know) of my time in Japan thus far.
