Shuying and I set off to climb Mt. Fuji! It seemed rather surreal that the day had come, and that we were actually going to climb the tallest mountain in Japan. The feelings at the beginning? Mostly excitement and anticipation, of reaching the peak and seeing the awesome sunrise I'd heard so much about! At the same time, I had a bit of trepidation - what if I couldn't make it to the top? After all, while I used to exercise regularly thanks to table tennis and cheerleading, for the past year the only exercise I'd gotten was from my shopping trips, so I wasn't exactly in the best shape. Then again, considering that when Feel Japan went and most of them could make it to the top, I figured I should be able to as well. =p

As soon as we entered the woods, it was nice and cooling, remniscent of autumn weather. There were less climbers than I'd expected, and one of the sources of motivation were from the signs that we spotted along the trail. Sometimes under the sign that points the way to the top there will be an encouraging message, as below:

Another source of motivation: getting the stamps on our sticks. We could only get the stamps at each station and not at any random place in the woods, so we had to push on and on, for the sake of getting those mementos! My grandfather had told me about it so that didn't come as a surprise. What did come as a surprise, however, was that we had to pay for each stamp, as well as pay for the toilet! Wow. Mt. Fuji turned out to be more expensive than I'd thought.

Early on in the climb, we were rather energetic, moving on at a quick pace and stopping periodically to snap silly pictures, or to capture the beautiful scenery. I liked it when we were out of the woods, feeling the wind in our hair and being able to overlook the vast lands below, seeing the patches of green, the mountains in the distance... It felt so refreshing! Everytime the climbing got monotonous, seeing the scenery made me feel more revitalised and good to go again.

To my surprise, there were quite a number of not-so-young members climbing the mountain. In fact, we met people in their 60s who were climbing Mt. Fuji for the first time! One guy jokingly said, "I wonder what I'm doing on a mountain at my age." When I see these people, I can't help but think it must be quite strenuous to climb for hours, since I saw them take breaks every few metres. If old people are attempting the climb, then we, young and fit at 22, have to make it to the top! That was my thought. It was rather like Shuying said; We are at our prime at our ages, when compared to the elderly. Having said that, in a way it made me feel that I'm not really allowed to feel tired, to say I'm tired... Not in the face of these people.

However, the truth was that I was tired! I was really, really tired from the 7th station onwards. The scenery didn't do much for my spirits anymore, because it seemed like we were seeing the same sight again and again, just on a larger scale from a higher perspective. Short breaks helped, but only for a short while in that after a few metres, my muscles started protesting again. Hey, going uphill for hours and hours was no easy feat! I have to be really thankful that Shuying was around, for if she wasn't plodding on ahead steadily, like a benchmark for me to follow, who knows? I might still be squatting somewhere on the mountain deliberating whether or not to continue pushing myself to go all the way up. Knowing that there were nowhere to go but up, no matter how daunting the path ahead was, I continued plodding on, albeit rather listlessly and in not so good a mood. At the last stretch towards the 8th station, our stop for the day, we linked hands, and that really helped. Maybe there was a sense of camaraderie, of friendship, and it gave me energy to go on.

It was a very relieved me when we reached our lodge in the evening, after five and a half hours of nearly non-stop trekking. Finally, yes! I'm here! was my thought. All I wanted to do was plonk my ass down somewhere and not move. After we dumped our bags in the sleeping quarters (the narrowest and most expensive of my travels ever!), I was actually summoned down for dinner over the speakers. It was something like "Foo Kaori, please come down for dinner." WOW! I felt like I was in primary school, or in the army! After dinner, we looked out the window and were astounded by this sight:

Remember how I was perpetually chasing the sunsets when I was on my Kyushu trip (coincidentally with Shuying as well)? I was counting on a gorgeous sunrise, but it was a wonderful bonus to have such a beautiful sunset as well! I was really happy, really trigger happy, but I shall post only two pictures here.

Since we had to wake up early to continue the climb to the peak to catch the sunrise, we, and the many other lodgers, went to bed after dinner. However, there were a few reasons why I found it hard to sleep.

1) It was only 7pm.
2) I was feeling bloated from dinner.
3) It was really cold.
4) I felt kind of dirty.
5) It was very cramped.
6) THERE WAS A SNORING SYMPHONY!

I was taken aback by just how many people snore when they sleep. It was freaking noisy, and the old man beside me was the champion snorer. Some people snored like they were choking/wheezing, and I listened carefully and somewhat fearfully that they would stop breathing. At times there were blessed moments of silence, only to be interrupted soon after by someone snoring. It was terrible, really. So I lay awake hoping my body would get rested even if I didn't fall asleep, listening to the howling wind outside and fretting. If the wind was as strong as it sounded, wouldn't we get blown off the side of the mountain when we ventured outside? I was worried we wouldn't be able to climb in strong wind conditions. More than that, I didn't want to go out into such wind, at such temperatures! In a way it was somewhat miraculous to me that despite it being summer in Japan, there were places (like the top of a mountain, for example) where it was like winter, with temperatures hovering around 5 degrees celsius.

At about 2am we got up, rummaged around in our rucksacks for our energy bars, covered our heads and strapped on our lights, and got ready to face the last stretch of our journey.

It was breathtaking outside, and no, I don't mean because of the wind. The night view was gorgeous, with the city below us glittering in its lights, and there was a line of lights dotting the paths of the mountain. Those came from hundreds and thousands of people who were climbing in the dark, for the purposes of watching the sunrise. It was absolutely breathtaking, watching everyone shuffle along quietly in the dark. Suddenly this reminds me of Narnia in The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe, where the people underground quietly toiled in the dark. Anyway, it was good having so much company for the climb up. Even though I didn't talk to anyone, I felt a sense of camaraderie with everyone else, because we all have a shared mission. It was like a pilgrimage, Shuying said, and I simply had to agree. I gained strength from that, and the few hours' rest did my body good. And if I ever needed more motivation in the freezing wind to go on, all I had to do was look up. The sky was so star-speckled, the likes of which I'd never seen before! It was b e a u t i f u l. Being a city dwellers (both Tokyo and Singapore) means that I've been deprived of stars. The sky above Mt. Fuji reminded me of the astrology posters, with greyish areas and white stars dotting the black background.

Due to the crowd, progress was slow, and we took longer than the estimated climb to make it to the peak. I was happy to make it to the top, and proud of myself, but I felt rather cheated. The goal was to make it to the peak to watch a gorgeous sunrise, but it was so cloudy and foggy, I didn't get to see the ball of fire rising from above the horizon in a glory of colours! It was like damn, I climbed for hours and hours for the sunrise, and I don't get it?! At the top, everyone was crowded at one side, and I soon realised why. Everyone was waiting for the sun to continue rising above a bunch of clouds, an alternative to watching it rise from the horizon. In its own way, that was pretty too, but I expected more. So I'm glad that I had the most gorgeous sunset the previous day, as a consolation!

It was freezing up there, but after we got some warm food in our bellies, we went in search of the post office. The route there was miserable. With the fog rolling in to cloud visibility and the barren landscape of volcanic rocks, it was like we had descended into hell, when climbing to the top of the world was supposed to put us in heaven!

After we were done with buying our "certificate of completion" and stamping our postcards and posted them, we finally made our way down, heading to the end of our journey! The climb up was arduous; The climb down wasn't that much better. It was mile after mile of sand, and it just got really boring after a while. The sun couldn't make up its mind whether to make an appearance or hide behind the clouds, so we had on and off sunniness, and it was rather annoying. Sand sand sand. After those few hours, we'd had enough of sand already!

Then it was finally over, the torture! Yes, many times I questioned: Why the heck did I pay good money to torture myself?! What on earth was I doing on a mountain?! At the end of the day, I have to admit it was a good experience, but I can say with some degree of certainty that it would probably be my first and last mountain climbing expedition. Maybe I'm a pampered person, because I don't much fancy having worms dropping from trees and climbing on my backpack, or having all sorts of bugs and flies landing on me. Eeks. So maybe I'm relatively fit, but I'm not much for the outdoors, not when it goes beyond trekking for hours. Haha.

We then headed to Atami to pamper ourselves, and the next day that was exactly what we did. To the beach we went!

Our last stop: Marine Spa. Like its name suggests, it was a spa, with jacuzzi, hotspring, slide, pool, sauna... For the first time in my life, I actually derived pleasure from sweating it out in a sauna. In a weird way, it made me realised that I have grown up! When kids attempted to come in with their parents, most stopped at the door, exclaimed its too hot, and made an about turn. So it's rather like only adults know how to enjoy saunas, and now I've joined that community. Wow.

So after some days and numerous hours, we were done with Mt. Fuji and Atami, and it was back to more familiarity. I HAVE CONQUERED MT. FUJI! It was a good last trip with a close friend, and an apt ending to my stay in Japan. :)