Tuesday, May 8, 2007

Fujisan

Last summer, after a nice 3 months in Japan, we ISUers met in Tokyo with the intention of visiting as much of Japan as possible... I will talk more about the plan tomorrow... Today I will talk about a huge achievement got by Havard and me ;-) We climbed mount Fuji, the highest mountain in Japan, during the night so we could see the sunrise from the summit.

The previous night, we had been partying in Roppongi (Tokyo) with Mic and his brother, Paolo and Sousuke and we had only had a nap in a manga cafe (my favourite manga kissa in Shinjuku, it is called Mambo and it is next to Don Quijote... just in case you read this from Japan). We started from the 5th station at around 2000 meters high. I will show all the photos in the rest of stations, to proof we climbed it ;-)




That night, several hundred people or even thousands climbed Fujiyama. That was incredible, kids and old people trying really hard to climb a mountain which is not so easy to climb... There was a moment many people was vomiting and many needed air bottles to breathe... kinda scary... Besides, as we climbed it in Summer, the temperature in Tokyo was around 30 deg and it was below zero in the top of the vulcano. Havard and me were not prepare for that temperature change!! I used all the T-shirts I was carrying for the 1-week adventure to try to survive... There were parts of the mountain, mainly near the top, where several climbing ways merged, in which people had to queue!! Unbelievable!! Only possible in Japan... :) At the end of the night, we started thinking we could not make it to the summit before the sunrise and so did many young japanese... The results was everybody rushing uphill to try to arrive. This was kind of scary coz everybody started pushing everybody and some people started climbing out of the climbing path! Finally we got through and watched the most beautiful sunrise in our lifes, in the country of the rising sun.




The worse part was coming all the way back to station five... not so easy after so many hours without sleeping...




There is a Japanese saying which states that you have to climb Fujisan once in your life. If you dont climb it, you are a fool... but if you climb it twice or more times you are fooler... I completely agree...

7 comments:

Alvaro said...

Fujisan has a especial climbing season that lasts for one month or so... I think from the end of July to middle or late August. Therefore, that is the only time to climb it unprofessionally. As there are many people willing to see the sunrise there, the mountain is extremely crowded those weeks with people from all over Japan.

I hope that helps ;-)

Havard said...

That climb up Mt.Fuji is the worst thing I have ever done in my life. I was completely fed up with anything related to rocks and mountains when we got back down. But with that said it was a truly amazing experience and I would recomend people to go there.

You remember we met this japanese dude on the bus that convinced us to buy rain coats and a flashlight? Good thing we started talking with that guy. Otherwise there would have been a dead norwegian laying on the slopes of Mt.Fuji :p

Alvaro said...

Hahaha, I remember that guy... and i also remember i didnt buy the raincoat and was about to die... I still remember when in the last station I started shivering because of the cold temperature... shit... next time i will consider local people's advice...

Havard said...

O yeah you didn't. Didn't you have to use newspapers or something inside all your t-shirts?

Alvaro said...

Yeah... i had to use that book with the schedule of all japanese trains to cover myself... paper is a good isolator... hahaha... do you remember later on we needed one of the pages I had torn away... hehe

Anonymous said...

Mai inglish es very bad, so tu ver si I jave anderstan I güil pruf de transleitin it:

".. habíamos bebido demasiado sake aquella noche, algo extraño sucedía dentro de mi cabeza... así es como me dí cuenta de que yo era Don Quijote, y que junto a Havard Panza lucharíamos contra el gigante Fuji.."

"... cogí mi armadura (me enfundé una a una 7 camisetas de manga corta y encima de la cabeza me puse un eschedule)..."

"... los aldeanos al verme temblaron asustados, y vitoreándome cual salvador me acompañaron hacia el castillo de Fuji para animarme en la lucha. Ancianos y niños se empujaban entre ellos con tal de ser los primeros en seguirme"

".. una vez en el castillo, ataqué al gigante Fuji con un sunrais*, y acabé con su vida. El pueblo me vitoriaba..."

*Sunrais (wikipedia): Técnica milenaria de lanzamiento de piedras por telekinesia.

JODER Álvaro, eso no se hace. Crees que esa puede ser la imagen que vayas dando por Japón de los españoles... y sobretodo... nunca debes ponerte un eschedule en la cabeza... luego la gente se asusta y huye, muriendo alguno aplastado por la masa...

... mejor sigo estudiando... ahm..
XD

Alvaro said...

Muy bueno Toni ;-)
Por supuesto que es correcto, jeje...