Japan (Day 2) – Mt Fuji Summit & Rest

Mon 20/07/2009

We took several rests along the way to the summit but the longest rest was at the 8th station at 3am. It was freezing up there and because we didn’t have adequate gear, it wasn’t a good idea to summit too early and freeze at the higher altitude. Even at the 8th station, the cold was unbearable and the howling winds made it even worse. There are benches you can sit on at each station so at the 8th station benches we wanted to take at least 45 minutes of rest or even nap. To counter the cold, we three strangers huddled up and shared our body warmth (still dressed of course). Everyone walking past would think, wtf are these guys doing? I managed to sleep for 10 minutes despite shivering for most of that time. All I had one was a t-shirt, thin north face jacket and trousers. I was barely warm in those clothes and I kept thinking when is the sun going to rise so I can get some warmth!

At 4:45am the sun broke over the horizon and the summit was edging closer. We sat on the side of the mountain taking in the sun rise and wondering to ourselves, if this has been all worth it? As the sun rose higher and higher above the horizon, we too got closer and closer to the summit. The queue to the summit at this point felt like it was taking longer than at any other stage. I was definitely fatigued and with only 4 hours of sleep in the past 24 hours, I started to feel weary and got a bit of a headache due to the higher altitude.

At 6:00am we reached Mt Fuji Summit and all we could think about was lets hurry up and get out of this wind and descend back to the 5th station. After a few photos we did make our way back down to the Bus. I thought making the descent was far more difficult than ascending to the summit. The reasons being that the road back down was quite slippery with loose rocks and since you were so fatigue it was easy to roll and ankle or tumble and hurt yourself. The entire descent was steep zig zags which felt never ending and I just kept thinking when this shit is going to end. It didn’t help that the others were waiting for me at the end of each zig zag because I was going so slow, sorry guys!!!

I was truly spent near the bottoms end and any amount of energy left was zapped away with the sun now heating me up and burning my face. My legs felt like they were going to collapse on me, I almost rolled my left ankle slipping on a rock and the final steps back to the 5th station felt like the steepest part of the journey. Everyone on the bus was sleeping except for the business men who were standing. We reached the hostel at approximately 10:30am and we only knew of one thing to do and that was to clean up and get some sleep!

My body felt hot like it had a fever when I woke up, my legs felt like they were missing and how I could only got 4 hours sleep was beyond me. My room mate who did the climb said people came into clean and vacuum making lots of noise but I was oblivious too it all. Had I been woken up by these cleaners, I too would have given them dirty looks like she did!

I did nothing for the rest of the evening as there wasn’t much to do in this little town! My fellow Mt Fuji climber and room mates decided to go for a walk and find a restaurant for dinner. We found a Ramen restaurant, ordered a banquet with some beers and enjoyed each others company.

smiles