An Adventure on Fuji-san

On relatively short notice (just less than a month), I decided with two friends to climb Mt. Fuji.

This wasn’t quite as ridiculous as it sounds. I had traveled with these friends in Japan before, specifically for a week of mountain hiking on the Kumano Kodō. While I live in a former swamp at just 400 feet above sea level, I know from other hikes that I handle altitude well enough to transition quickly. So I hopped a plane and burned some miles to Tōkyō.

But I didn’t land and immediately start hiking; I love visiting Japan, and we made a few stops first.

Haru Urara

Before the climb, I made good on a goal and traveled to meet Haru Urara. If you’re not familiar with her story (and most Americans wouldn’t be), here’s a short documentary that explains it all pretty well.

Haru Urara is featured in one of my Storytime From Japanese History talks. She lives now on a small farm in Chiba, and I had written ahead to arrange to meet her. She’s shorter than I expected, and maybe that helps to explain her record. She’s older now, and kinda looking her years, but she looks happy and cared for, and I was delighted to make her acquaintance. (She loves carrots! and her pal Mercury.)

Hiroshima Kagura

My travel companion Erica had located a kagura performance in Hiroshima, which we made sure to take in while down south. (We wanted to go down for Miyajima, the atomic bomb memorial, and more.) This was fabulous. I was excited to discover that night’s performance would be of Rashōmon, a folk tale featuring famous oni Ibaraki-dōji and Shuten-dōji, historical figures in fantastic combat, and a side mention of Abe no Seimei.

Here’s one scene in which Shuten-dōji, dressed as Watanabe no Tsuna’s beloved wetnurse to gain his trust and access to his house, is frustrated by his refusal and briefly reveals his true oni nature before recovering and pleading again for entry.

They’re doing fun modern kagura which includes fog effects and streamers to represent magic (color coded for divine and evil magics).

After the performance, the audience was invited to go down to see — and pose with — the impressive costumes. The actors are dancing in costumes that can weigh more than 40 pounds!

I asked about using photo and/or video in my talks (we were allowed to take photos, but not to share extensive video), and I ended up having a fun conversation with some of the management. They were happy to find that an American was familiar with many of these figures and an enthusiast of Japanese history and folklore, and I was glad to get permission to show some kagura in my talks!

Mt Fuji

To be clear, we had said from the beginning that if the weather were dangerous, we would not climb. Even though Fuji-san is a very popular mountain and generally very safe, experienced hikers know that if the mountain says, “Not today,” you listen. The forecast showed a bit of light rain at mid-elevation, nothing serious, so we climbed.

Of course, the thing about mountains, and especially stratovolcanos standing alone, is that they make their own decisions about weather and don’t really care about your forecasts.

So the hike up started well enough. Fuji has several route choices at various difficulties, and we took the Fujinomiya route, which is the shortest but steepest route to the summit. And it is a steep climb; there is a stretch of 30 to 40 feet that’s horizontal, but other than that, every step is a step upward. My pack was heavy, because I was carrying extra gear, too much food, and 3.5 L of water. (Some people carry less water. Those people have never run out of water on a hike, and they’re confident the mountain stations will always have a supply to sell them, etc. I have trust issues and wanted 2 days’ worth of water for a 2 day hike.) The trail is typically volcanic rocky, all pebbles and stones and lava flow, requiring more muscle to stabilize on the sliding surface than just to walk. So the climb was a workout, not gonna lie.

There was a scattering of rain, as predicted, but I wasn’t worried. I had rain gear in my pack for an emergency. But it was getting colder more quickly than I’d expected…

Then the storm hit.

Thunderstorms on a mountain are no joke. We re-gathered at Station 9.5, one hut below the summit, and though our night reservations were at Station 10, we had no intention of going there. We were far above the treeline, so a hiker and her trekking poles would be the tallest thing around, and winds were 75 kph.

We knew, too, that 7 people had died on Fuji in the previous 2 weeks, several of them blown off the trail by high winds. So staying put, instead of climbing upward into the stronger winds at the summit, was an easy decision.

Fortunately, Station 9.5 was able to provide us with emergency accommodations. (We figured out later the staff had generously given us their area — don’t worry, they still had sleeping bags! They slept in the main room.) We were above the snow and Fuji’s heights are typically near freezing even in summer; I slept in my clothes, extra wool socks, a silk sleep sack inside my sleeping bag, a Buff hat, and ear warmer band, a down coat, and alpaca mittens, and I was only a little cold during the night. I know I get cold at night, and no regrets on carrying the extra warmth!

By morning, the thunderstorm had ended and the winds softened to 45 kph gusts, but the rain continued. The forecast suggested the rain would spend itself in a couple of hours and would remain only at high altitude, and after conferring, we decided that we were going to get wet either way, so we might as well make a stab for the summit and then descend below the rain.

We did reach the summit! I had originally wanted to hike the circuit around the crater, but that was an additional couple of hours that would not have been wise in those conditions, for trail safety and temperature reasons. (Plus, there’s little view inside a rain cloud.) So we marked our peak victory and started down.

The rain would stop, they said. The rain would be only high up on the mountain, they said.

Spoiler: it didn’t and it wasn’t.

In fact, it rained all the way down the mountain, and the temperature stayed low. We split up because those of us in lighter coats needed to increase speed to avoid hypothermia. Yes, I had rain gear! but honestly, it didn’t matter, not in those conditions. Rain was coming in hard and horizontal, and despite a hat and a hood and a Buff snugged tight about my neck, I was soaked through all five torso layers to wet underwear. I was mentally resolved that I’d likely have mild frostbite in fingers and toes before I reached the trailhead.

But once I got up to speed, I stabilized my body temperature, so that the rain was less an immediate danger and more an annoyance.

However, I knew I had to keep moving to keep that equilibrium. That meant I had to move carefully enough on the wet scree and streaming trail that a slip or fall wouldn’t stop me. Usually Fuji is fairly crowded, but I could see no one before or behind me for much of the upper half, so I couldn’t even rely on being spotted and called in if I went down.

The worst part, in all seriousness: I knew there was no relief at the end. The bus ran from the trailhead every 2 hours, so without perfect timing, I’d reach the bottom only to stand shivering in sodden clothes for a long time. Then it was an hour’s bus ride back to town, where I had no hotel room waiting, only a 3 hour train ride back to Tōkyō. There was no end to look forward to.

But stopping wasn’t an option, either.

The station huts were packed full of people who were not ascending any further, and there was no place to rest for most of the way down. I didn’t really feel comfortable stopping, anyway; the huts are not heated, and stopping meant risking a core body temperature drop that wouldn’t be wise. My legs were getting very fatigued, and I used my poles aggressively. I fell twice on the slippery trail, but neither time seriously because of my poles.

It’s hard to think about dehydration when your mouth is full of water blowing in while you breathe, but I eventually realized I was not drinking enough, probably because my mouth always felt full of water. That was easy to fix. I did not stop to eat, because I had no shelter and didn’t want to wrestle with my pack in the rain.

Despite their rain covers, all our packs were also soaked completely through. The wind pushed rain through the elastic cover edges. (This meant, when we got back to town, we had no dry clothes to change into.)

I did stop at Station 6, nearly finished, to check my phone (impossible to use the touch screen in the rain) and make sure my friends were both still up and safe. Susan was ahead of me, Erica behind. I got a snack from the hut, as digging into my wet pack was too daunting a project.

But, good news, we each eventually reached the trailhead and then the bus stop. We caught the bus back to town, where one of Japan’s ubiquitous konbinis (convenience stores) sold us plastic bags (to stuff gear into and stop dripping enough to be allowed on a train) and towels. Then Erica and I detoured off the direct train line to a local bath house.

“Konbanwa. Fujisan kara kimashita. Ofuro ni hairitaidesunga.” Good evening, we’ve just come off Mt. Fuji, and we’d like to take a bath.

We showered extensively as appropriate and then went into the hot pools. BLISS. I stayed submerged until my core temperature was somewhere north of normal, and then some more. It was a very nice bath house. The only regrettable part–and it was regrettable–was that we had no dry clothes to put on. I made an attempt with a locker room hair dryer, but the task was far too great for the tool. In the end, Erica and I squeeeeezed back into our cold, wet clothes. (My shoe locker window at the entrance was completely fogged over.) That was enough to get us home, though.

The before and after (note the visibility difference!):

Moral of the story: Always carry proper gear on a mountain. Not having enough layers or rain gear could have led to a very different outcome. There were lots of people hiking with minimal clothing and equipment — I think many of them abandoned the climb when the light rain started — and I know that’s tempting because Fuji is a very popular mountain, so it must be safe, right? But it’s still a mountain and should be respected. The easy days can be pretty easy, but people die every year when they assume that any day should be an easy day.

But the win: We did summit, despite the storm, and I got all the station brands and stamps on my staff to prove it. (I forgot to pick up my goshuin, however. I stood right at the shrine counter, and I forgot. I blame weather distraction and the distraction of someone getting a staff stamp, for which I joined. But I’m really disappointed that I did not get my goshuin, a calligraphy shrine visitation card, for my book. I do have the goshuin for Fuji Hongū Sengen Taisha at the base of the mountain.)

Fuji is 3776 m or 12,388 feet high — far from the tallest mountain I’ve done, which is 16k, but definitely a memorable one.

And because we did reach the summit, I was able to mail the dozens of post cards I’d carried up for my Kickstarter backers, as Fuji-san has an official post office drop with special cancellation beside the summit shrine.

Fun side story: We each carried Calbee chips up the mountain, as we’d each been given a free packet with a Hokusai Fuji theme at the Hokusai museum. We documented the preparations and adventures of Pepper, Cal-kun, and Potaro on social media (3 samples below). Poor Pepper ruptured with the change in air pressure during the ascent, but Cal-kun made it to the top to be snacked upon before I started my descent.

Only The Dead Face North update: the 5th title in the Kitsune Tales series is coming soon! Pre-orders are just about to close, so hop over if you haven’t yet. And I should have some of the TTRPG materials available at Gen Con, so please stop by my author table there.