Day 176 May 4th 2007, No Sweat - Kawaguchi-ko

With the conditions perfect for hiking, warm and sunny with a gentle breeze, I knew the 14km walk we had planned today would be a great one. I would certainly be building up a sweat as we climb to around 1,700m but luckily Japan has a solution to replace those lost fluids, a can of sweat.

Sweat with replacement minerals

Mountains are great to look especially ones like Fuji San and even better to climb, however it being spring the snow was still thick on Fuji and the trail to the top closed. There are plenty of hiking tracks nearby including the one we picked up Mitsu-toge-yama which still got us pretty high 1785m. With such great conditions we had a view of Fuji all day.

The trail was well marked and we managed with the help of some friendly Japanese hikers not to get lost. Navigation isn't actually that difficult you just have to line up the Japanese characters with the same ones on the map, that's if you can find the right sign to look at. On route we came across 88 little Buddhas like the one below in a forest clearing before we reached the summit.

On reaching the summit of our walk we enjoyed a beer overlooking Fuji San, not served from a bar but from a vending machine. These are everywhere we have been in Japan but I never expected to see one at the top of a mountain. Could you imagine having these in England?

Above: The view of Fuji San. Below: Me and Shelley at the summit of Mitsu-toge-yama

We were pretty pleased with our navigation today but with aching feet eager to get back to the hotel and soak in a Japanese Onsen (hot bath) Walking back to the station to catch our bus we flagged one down just round the corner, the bus set off round the lake towards our hotel before taking the right fork in the road vs the left to our hotel, a couple of minutes later we were in the mountains, uh oh. We decided at this point that it would not be a good idea to get off the bus until we got to the next decent sized town. This town was Kofu and it was 90 minutes away. On arriving in Kofu we made some enquiries on how to get back to Kawaguchi-ko and as we expected it was the 90 minute bus ride back.

The bus driver was quite surprised to see us again and after trying to explain in our best sign language that we had got on the wrong bus we were soon on our way back. I think he felt sorry for us as he didn't charge us for the return trip. So 3 hours later we were pretty much back where we started. Deciding not to risk another tour of the local countryside we got a taxi back to the hotel, where we finally got to soak in the Onsen.

Highlights: A fantastic 7 hour hike with great views of Fuji San