Greetings cavedwellers
Location: Mt. Mizugaki, Hokuto, Yamanashi
Starting and stopping point: Daimeniwashita Boulder Parking Lot 大面岩下ボルダー駐車場
Mountains climbed: Takamiiwa~~Iimori~~Mizugaki
Getting there/getting around: The Mizugaki Sanso is accessible by bus from Nirasaki train Station
Map: Yama to Kogen Chizu #27 KINPU-SAN・KOBUSHI OKUCHICHIBU 金峰山・甲武信 奥秩父
Weather Information: Mt. Mizugaki Weather
Distance: 13.5km
Elevation: Lowest: 1,456m Highest: 2,230m Total Ascent: 1,456m Total Descent: 1,456m
Technical considerations/difficulty: This is a hike with a lot of scrambling and climbing. ⛰ The top 200 meters of ascent necessitate climbing with both hands and feet. Despite the necessity of using hands as well as legs, there are few chains or ladders because there is a plethora of tree roots and rocks to use as handholds. Also, it's not very exposed except at the top. Snow has already started to fall on nearby Mt. Kinpu (2,499m)🏔 but none had fallen yet on Mizugaki. I saw climbers of all ages yesterday. Some people looked less happy than others, though. 😆
Facilities: There is food, lodging and a restroom at the nearby Mizugaki Sanso and there are the same amenities as well at Fujimidaira Hut. There are also tent sites at the hut. There are other campgrounds in the local area as well. A free waterhole is about 5 minutes down the trail from the Fujimidaira Hut. There are no more restrooms above that hut. Be prepared for a long wait between bathroom breaks.
Thoughts/observations/recommendations: This is really a wonderful area. I hiked around here for the first time two summers ago. That was awesome. This time, visiting in autumn, was great, too!
Now, for my blather. The reason I put the blather last is because I assume my some of my cavedwellers might be bothered by blogger blather the way I am. Oh, brother. What a bother to be bothered by a brother blogger's blather.
For example, I like to cook. Sometimes I get the idea to make something new and fire up the google machine (btw, don't believe them, google is evil) and search for a recipe for that dish. Invariably, I find myself at a blog and usually the post starts, not with the recipe or a list of ingredients, but with a sentence like this, "My Pa-paw--who had high cheekbones--really liked his cold crab omelets . . . "
Then I have to scroll down through the family history and organ recitals, "That's when Aunt Betty had gout. Poor thing. . .", and hunt for the recipe. If I was interested in someone's heritage, I would be checking out ancestry dot com instead of recipes 'r us. While some of these blogposts are interesting, there is only about a 1/1,024 chance that I care about the life story of the cook who is writing it. (She is probably lying about Grandpa Ambrose Finnigan, anyway. Come on, man.)
OK, that's done.
I haven't blogged in a bit. My past couple of hikes were local and I've blogged those spots to death. Yesterday was different. I got to one of my favorite areas and caught the fall colors at their peak.
Like I was saying, this area around Mizugaki is great. Mizugaki is one of the 100 Famous Mountains as well as is nearby Mt. Kinpu.
I left home at 5 am. I thought I'd get to the area about 9 but some of the areas I passed through were too pretty and I found myself stopping to take a lot of pictures.
