The Japanese have a saying that goes something like this: one would be a fool never to climb Mt. Fuji once but a fool to climb it twice.  Having just scaled the mighty Fuji-san (as the Japanese call it), I can attest to the wisdom of this saying.

It all started at about 3 PM on a Thursday, when a merry band of adventure-seekers set out for Gotemba (one of three cities encircling Mt. Fuji).  There were ten of us in total, including three friends/colleagues from Chicago, five of my colleagues in Japan, Lizzi and me.  We piled into two vans and about two hours later checked into a cozy little cottage in the foothills of the mountain.  Once there, we unpacked and readied ourselves for dinner, which was a hearty meal designed to fuel ourselves for the insanity that would ensue the following day.  A few Sapporos in, we were full of self-assuredness, each of us confident in our ability to easily make the trek the next day.  Surely it wouldn’t be as hard as our Japanese friends were making it out to be.  Little did we know….

To be honest, expectations were hard to manage coming into the hike.  After hearing from our Japanese friends that we would need to be ultra-prepared, all the while hearing from our Western friends that it’s a piece of cake, we weren’t certain what to expect.  What we came to learn was that this hike is indeed no walk in the park, and that anyone who says it is easy is either an incredible athlete or totally full of shit.  There is a life lesson wrapped up in all of this: always trust the locals.

The day of the hike began ridiculously early.  3 AM to be exact.  Since there was no circulation whatsoever in our rooms, most of us woke up in pools of our own sweat, surely not a good way to start a day when hydration would prove important.  Once we shook off the grogginess and took time to ring out our sweat-stained shirts, we all rubbed the sleep from our eyes and made our way downstairs to enjoy yet another grubfest designed to stuff our bodies with the energy and nutrients needed to survive a day that would probably see us each burn somewhere between 3000 and 4000 calories.  At the conclusion of breakfast, we each dutifully packed our backpacks and Camelpacks to the brim with energy bars, cookies, sweets, nuts, water, rain coats, hats, sunglasses, extra layers for warmth and first-aid kits.  Then we set off for the 20-minute ride to station five, the launching-off point where we would begin our trek along the Subashiri route (there are four routes in total and ours is listed as the easiest, which I’m convinced is incorrect).

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