For the emperor's birthday holiday this week, I went to Lake Shoji, the smallest of the Fuji Five Lakes. This is one more leg in a long project of hiking the mountains on the shores of all five lakes in an unbroken line. I've completed most of the western four lakes. I have more work to do on Lake Ashi to the east.
Getting there/getting around: This is accessible by bus on the blue line from Kawaguchiko Station or Fujisan Station. There are very few buses and it's a long ride. There is a free parking spot right next to the trailhead where I parked my scooter.
Map: Yama to Kogen Chizu 32 FUJI-SAN MISAKA・ASHITAKA-YAMA 富士山 御坂・愛鷹山
Total Time: 6 hours 44 minutes Break time: 36 minutes
Distance: 15.4km
Elevation:Lowest: 900m Highest: 1,465m Total Ascent: 1,345m Total Descent: 1,345m
Technical considerations/difficulty: Not a terribly technical hike. Not much exposure. It's all well below the treeline. There is little in the way of chains or ropes. There are steep parts and there are some parts of the trail that have been washed away in landslides. There hasn't been much snow this season and I didn't even bother to put on my crampons.
Facilities: Nothing on the trail to speak of except for a sheltered picnic bench at the panoramadai.
Thoughts/observations/recommendations:
I've said it before. There is a certain world-famous brand name that I don't patronize because--well I won't go into their myriad of offenses here. I won't buy their products but I do begrudgingly agree that their slogan is great. Just Do It. Yesterday was another day when Just Doing It paid off for me. I had the day off and wanted to get a day of hiking in but the weather didn't look great and the futon was mighty warm and cozy at 5:00 am. And . . . the plan for the day entailed riding my scooter 3 bone-chilling hours before even starting a long day. The prospect of a long, cold grey day with no worthwhile views made me wonder if the risks didn't outweigh the possible rewards.
The sky matched my grey mindset for the entire 3 hours I spent on the road out to the foothills of Mt. Fuji. I usually make the ride non-stop. On this trip, I stopped 3 times to warm up.
Then, just as I reached my destination, the sky cleared up and the temperature rose a few degrees. Once again I was glad that I was Just Doing It.
I never regret Just Doing It. Sometimes I stop doing it when something is stupid or dangerous--but that is something different.
The place: As Lake Shoji is the smallest and least developed of the Fuji Five Lakes it is a sweet spot to visit. It's not really easy to get to for a day trip so there are fewer tourists than on the other lakes. There are only a few hotels and restaurants. One hotel has campsites on the lakeside. The panoramadai and the lakeshore have the best views. I did see on one of the billboards for a hotel that they have a rotenburo (露天風呂--outside bath) with a view of Mt. Fuji. That would be cool! If I weren't such a cheapskate, I would try it. For my purpose of tying up the loose threads between this lake and Lake Sai to the east, I hiked far to the east to Mt. Yokosawanoto. If your purpose is a pleasure hike with nice views, I think you should skip about half of my plan. I would recommend going to the Paroramadai before heading northeast to Mt. Sanpobun and finally descending down to the lake from there. That portion of my hike was where all the best views were. The last several hours of my hike were not the most photogenic.
This is what the map looks like:
Let me show you some pictures.
Remember what I said about access to this place being difficult? Check out the bus schedule. It's a long wait if you miss a bus!
The trailhead to the Panoramadai
Fuji sometimes forms lenticular (lense-shaped) clouds. When they are directly over the mountain, they are called kasagumo--"bamboo umbrella-cloud". When they form to the leeward side of the mountain, they are called tsurushigumo--"roll clouds". I think these must be tsurushigumo.
Looking west from the Panoramadai. That is Lake Motosu--the western-most of the five lakes--down below. My last trek on this side of the lake region will be to circumambulate that lake. Lake Motosu has a massive tranquil campground.
Mt. Omuro is directly in front of Fuji in the next picture. I climbed that from the south side of this lake in August. That is in the Aokigahara Forest. That has a sad reputation for being a suicide destination.
This is where I exited the woods at the end of my trek. The trail I used from Mt. Goko down to the lake is a secondary trail and doesn't appear on all maps. You can get an idea of the condition of the trail by the condition of its entrance. That rickety wooden thing in the middle of the picture is a stair/ladder.
What a sight to be presented with when walking out of the woods.
I got a kick out of being able to spot the buildings of the 5th Station from 10 miles away.
I couldn't get enough of this view.
On the way home . . .
From the Narusawa area
3 lakes later . . .
That's all for now. Have a great day. Don't forget to subscribe if you haven't already. The button for that is in the pop-out menu on the right.
Hello cave critters. Welcome to the last post of the year.
I have been casting about for new mountains to climb and it's getting mildly difficult to find mountains I haven't climbed already that are within commuting distance. I was spoiled when I got bitten by the mountain bug. I live close enough to Okutama that for a few years I could simply take my bicycle and find a new mountain. Now I need to go farther away.
Yesterday, I chose a spot between Lake Yamanaka in Yamanashi Prefecture and Lake Tanzawa in Kanagawa Prefecture. I've hiked all around Yamanaka and have hiked quite a bit in the Tanzawa area, but never in this corner of Kanagawa. Let me get the details out of the way so I can share some pictures with you.
Mountains climbed: Mts Mikuni~Moujin~Yubune~Shirokuranoto~Furo (North and South Peaks)~Oiwa~Teppokinoto
Getting there/getting around: There is a parking lot at the Mikuni Pass. There are buses that stop close by the lake. Mt. Mikuni and Mt. Teppokinoto are convenient to buses. There is also a bus stop at the Myoujin Pass.
Elevation: Lowest: 395 meters Highest: 1,320 meters Total Ascent: 1,891 meters Total Descent: 1,891 meters
Technical considerations/difficulty: This was not a very technically challenging hike, although it was long. There were only two spots I recall where ropes were in place. For the most part it was not too steep. One portion where the trail is not really well-marked and you need to use common sense to pick your way is between Yozuku Pass (世附峠) and the Yozuku River below. To descend from there to the river, you need to find your way down a spider's web of forestry roads. They are all in disrepair. Some of them dead end. Portions of them have disappeared in landslides and you must decide whether to detour or turn back. That part of the hike took me a lot longer than I estimated it would. After that, the final several miles of the hike are along a closed, lonely forestry road. That wasn't in very bad shape, though. I was able to make up some time.
Facilities: Nothing commercial. My (2019) map shows restrooms at the Myojin Pass (明神峠) and the Yozuku Pass (世附峠) but I can't recall seeing them when I was there. I seem to remember Yozuku Pass as being especially barren. Maybe there used to be a restroom.
Just hold it. Patience is a virtue.
Thoughts/observations/recommendations: One of the nice things about this hike was that there was nobody there. Well, almost nobody. I did see two guys eating lunch at the top of Mt. Furo. And I happened upon one fisherman by the river who happened to be relieving himself just as I was coming around the corner. That was funny. He really didn't expect anyone to show up when he decided to do his business al fresco. Being Japanese, he still tried to be polite and do the greeting/small-talk thing with me.
Without zipping up. 😂
I'm really glad Japanese people don't shake hands.
This was probably my last trek for 2022. I have thoroughly enjoyed the mountains this year. I'm glad to have ended the year on a day of good weather and am looking forward to getting out again to start 2023 right off the bat. I'm not sure what my plan is for the next year. I've been going out at least once a week for the past 2 (or 3?) years. Part of me thinks it would be sane to slow down. The other part of me says "Why?" I always enjoy the mountains and I really like to think about them after I come home.
I'll tell you a secret, dear reader. I would be keeping this blog even if nobody read it. It's more for me than for anyone else. I just want to remember what I've done. If I can make some happy by showing them some beautiful pictures or if I can give someone ideas about hiking in Japan, that's great. I don't expect it, though.
Anyways . . .
Here are some pictures:
The first Google Earth screenshot shows a map oriented to the west. This gives a sense of where I was in relation to Mt. Fuji and Lake Yamanaka. The best views I had of Fuji were at the beginning and the end of the day since I started and ended nearer to Fuji.
If you notice, there are little green triangles dotting the screenshot. Those are places I've been before. I don't know why, but Google Earth has seemed to lose about half of them. I have such a bad memory that I sometimes forget the places I have climbed without seeing some kind of documentation.
You can see Mt. Mikuni at the top left of my footprints. From that point, there is a grey line tracing a ridge up to the top of Fuji. That is the prefectural boundary between Yamanashi to the north and Shizuoka to the south. A trail runs along the border. I hiked that trail as far as the Misaka Pass on Route 138 earlier this year. A little further along from there that trail joins the Subashiri Trail to the top of Fuji.
Oriented to the north
I think I took this picture from the street at the Yamanakako Panorama Dai on Route 730.
Those mountains on the northeast side of Lake Yamanaka have great views.
After 2 hours on the bike, I was glad to get moving. It was a few degrees below freezing for the first few hours.
The next picture is of yesterday's furthest point; Mt. Furo. This mountain's name translates to something like eternally young.
I had a decision to make here. My planned route would take me down off this ridge into a winding river valley which would lead me more-or-less in a circle back to my departure point. The return route was much longer because it was less direct. BUT, it was a road, not a trail and I assumed I would make better time on that than climbing. I wanted to get back to the area I started from by sunset at 4:38. Specifically, I wanted to get to Mt. Tepponokinoto* for sunset. I climbed that earlier this year but missed out on what promised to be a good view by bad weather. I hoped to make up for that by catching the sun going down.
*Tepponokinoto means "Gun~Tree~Head."
I knew that I would make it if I just returned the way I came, but I would actually be too early. Also, I like to cover as much territory as possible and avoid retracing my steps as much as possible. I knew I would be cutting it close for time because I had lost a half hour on the road in the morning. (I made a few bathroom breaks just to warm up!)
In the end, I decided to go with my original plan. Stick around to find out what happened.
Soon after coming off of Mt. Furo, just passed Yuzuku Pass, I descended on a trail that was shown as a dotted line on one of my maps. It doesn't show up on my other maps. It turned out to be a network of forestry roads. Some parts of it were in great repair. Some parts were washed out. No one of the roads really matched the map. Getting to the bottom of the valley took a long time because it necessitated a lot of switchbacks.
This spot is where I first saw some deer. There were signs of them--scat, barking--all day, but from this point until almost the end of the day I kept running into them. They don't show up in this picture, though. I am showing the picture just to show the condition of the road.
In some places the road was great.
After about 40 minutes, I got to the bottom and the Yuzuku River.
At the river, I discovered that the road, Route 729, that I was to start walking on was more of a forestry road than a tertiary road, like I thought it would be. It was completely blocked off to cars and there wasn't sign of a soul in sight. I was a little worried what this might mean time (and safety)-wise.
I encountered some more time wasters on the way. It seemed like I could not go 50 feet without coming across deer. I love seeing deer and I can't help taking their picture. It began to concern me as the clock was ticking.
Look at this if you want video of some of the deer I saw.
I eventually got to the point where I stopped taking their pictures.
I was watching my time and my pace and knew that I would be really cutting it close to try to make the sunset. They are cute, though. Especially at this time of year. The adults have now big white bushy tails which make their hoppy way of running funny.
After I stopped taking pictures of the deer, I made better time. After about 7 km on the forestry road, I turned into the woods again for the push up to my objective. Time was tight. I had only 1 hour and 18 minutes and 4.6 km (3.1 miles) to go. The problem wasn't just the distance I had to go horizontally, it's that I also had to ascend 520 meters. How long does it take to walk up 5 soccer fields? I thought I might make it if I hustled. I ran where I could.
About 50 feet to the top . . .
Close enough. I'm glad I got this much of a view.
Finally at the top.
🕺😎🌅
I got to my scooter at 5:02. It took me 20 minutes before I could hop on and go. I needed to put on a few more layers and the temperature had dropped so much I had to stop and warm my fingers up for each button I needed to button and each zipper I needed to zip.
Well cave creatures, that sunset lowers the curtain on my cave for the year.
I hope that 2022 was good for you and that 2023 will be even better.
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