The trip began Friday afternoon at 3 p.m., 18 of us plus Declan (who was yet again "selected" (more appropriately "forced") to climb the mountain with us. Several times leading up to the trip he tried to get it canceled, and now I can see why, as climbing that mountain 9 times is no easy task. We started from station 5, which is 2400 meters above sea level, and had to proceed to 3776 meters, or the summit of the mountain. The trip is divided up into several segments, separated by "stations", which are numbered 5 (the beginning of the Fujinomiya trail, the one we climbed), 6, 7, 7,5, 8, 9, 9.5, and 10/summit. The reason for the ".5" stations is that some of the huts or stations were originally too far apart, and this makes climbing more bearable. The entire thing did take about 7 hours to make the ascent, though, and we arrived at about 3 a.m. at the summit of the volcano (which has been dormant for 300 years). We even had to leave behind one of our members at station 7.5 (3010 meters up) because he was getting sick from the altitude. This surprised all of us, because he's probably the most fit person to have gone on the trip, but altitude sickness is serious and affects everyone in different ways. I was able to "force" my way to the top, carrying somebody else's backpack, along with mine, and my large water bottle.
The sun was due to come up soon, and it was absolutely breathtaking to watch the sun come up from the mountaintop. First, the sky was layered yellow, blue, and red, some of it reflections from Tokyo; second the sky turned a bright crimson as if it were about to all burst loose at once; third, that crimson became a brilliant yellow as the sun finally appeared (and began to warm us all up). The summit is 3776 meters above sea level, and it gets pretty cold at night (and the air is thin/lacking in oxygen), so I had to keep walking around for about an hour so I didn't lose feeling in my extremities. After that, it was time to head down, or at least get ready to do so.
I purchased the aforementioned stick with a few other fellow climbers/classmates, but was the only one to actually get all of the stamps, as some of them didn't notice the stamp shop at certain stations. It felt overall worth it, like I managed to accomplish many things on this trip. Sure, I did fall twice and have slight injuries on each of my arms (left arm on Friday evening, just a small cut/scrape; right arm on Saturday morning, scraped up elbow and bruise on the arm), but that's what comes from climbing that monstrosity of a mountain.
But who can neglect what happened during the second to last leg of our descent? Nobody, not even the crazy people who decided to start and continue climbing during the HAIL STORM. Yes, we had a hail storm that lasted probably about 30 minutes, which made the second to last leg of the trip seem much longer than it should have been. I had been able to see the stopping point/station for about an hour, but the trail just continued to wind and wind, seeming like it would never take us there. The last leg was just misty with a bit of rain; I got my last stamp done at the base/station 5, and now have a walking stick from Mt. Fuji with 9 stamps on it (one from the summit, one that comes pre-burned into the stick, one from station 9.5, one from station 9, one from station 8, one from station 7.5, one from station 7, one from station 6, and the aforementioned one at the base). Besides that, it looks cool.
In so few words, I'll conclude this post with a Japanese proverb (or a re-wording of it) and my thoughts on it.
-A wise man will climb Mt. Fuji one time. A fool will climb it again.
I think, at least for now, I'll remain the wise man.
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