Wow, I'd have to rank today as the third or fourth hardest day in my life. The only things above it were swimming 80x100 on the 1:20 when I was 17, swimming 20x100 sprint on the 1:30 when I was in 8th grade and climbing up high divide in the middle of summer. If it was in better shape climbing would have been a snap. However I haven't been in climbing shape for the last 4 years. I climbed anyway...
The day started out well enough. I hooked up with two brother from Illinois named Jessy and Shawn. They were really cool guys. Jessy works for video game company as an animator and Shawn has his masters in Economics and works in a pet store :). They were great climbing partners. We all kept up with each other really well. Shawn way almost always head because he had done track in College, but I was close behind most of the time.
We got to the Mountain at 10:30am. On the way up I talked to a crazy Russian American guy who has been in Japan for 2 years just hanging out on his parents money. He originally wanted to learn Japanese, but got kicked out of school by the Yakuza headmaster because he was Russian. It sounded like he had just wandered East Asia ever sense. The night before he tried to climb all the way up Mt.Fuji but got lost near the base and ended up spending 10 hours in the woods at night. He got 2 hours of sleep and went at it again. As I said crazy.
We got started right a way and had easy going for a while. At some point in time it got really hard. Thats when I found out the people I was hiking with thought this way a day hike. One of them didn't have a coat, neither of them had ponchos or enough water. Thankfully I had extra water, but they had to buy the ponchos for a steep price on the Mountain.
We continued hiking. For 4 hours, I think the final count was ~1000m in 6km. Just slightly hard. We had to scamble over rocks for more than half the time. It didn't help that the trail was basically closed down due to the Mountain being out of season. At the 7.5th station we realized we had a choice. Either climb the Mountain all the way or make the last bus back. We choose to go to the top. What followed was pure elevation gain for the next 3 hours (we had already hiked for one).
We finally made it to the top. The view was pretty amazing. Although it was mostly clouds. I got some pictures, not enough because I could barely think. You can get altitude sickness at 3776m and I think I did a bit. At least I felt a little hazy. Shawn and I hiked to the real summit, but Jessy was feeling sick enough that he threw up and stayed behind. The view worth it only to say that we've been to the top of Fuji. Up at the top we ran into this 60 year old man who said he hiked Mt.Fuji every week. Apparently he was trying to get used to altitude sickness so he could climb the Himalayas. He was a beast. We got to the top around 3ish, and the hike around the crater took about an hour. When we got back to Jessy he was shivering. Not good. We gave him the rest of the water, made him put on a rain poncho and we started walking. He warmed up pretty quickly, but I had a bit of a scare.
The walk down was quick, but scary. Basically you slide all the way down on loose gravel. Thats right slide 6km down. We also had to race against the daylight. We had a flashlight, but neither Jessy or Shawn had real cold weather gear and I realized I forgot my jacket at the hostel. I could have sworn I packed it. I gave us until 6 before the sun went out. I was about right. It was at 6:30. Thankfully at that point we were far enough down the mountian that it was actually getting warm again. We only had to walk about .75km in the dark, over a mostly flat surface.
Finally we got to the parking lot knowing full well the bus had left about 3 hours ago. (It was about 7 at the time). I checked my phone, and to my surprise I couldn't get reception. Everywhere else on the mountain I could, even the summit. Thankfully these two guys from Tokyo also had come down at the same time. The 5 of us split a cab down the mountain. I think they were more than happy to split the fare 5 ways. Each of us only ended up paying 20$. Not that bad for an 45min long cab ride.
Anyhow I'm dead tired now. I think its time to chill in an Onsen and sleep early.
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