Japan Trip 2012, Day 3 - Mount Fuji (Pre-climb)

Alright, I'm finally on the day of Mount Fuji, though this first post is getting a little long, so this first post will just be what we did getting there with some warnings about what we encountered. Honestly, I had gotten sick earlier, and was actually feeling the brunt of it yesterday. Fortunately, most of the ill effects only lasted a few hours on that day, and consisted of an off-and-on appetite and a fever. Maybe this wasn't exactly a good idea, but when I woke up I felt mostly fine, and so told my friends that I was good for going up Mount Fuji like we planned on this day. The route we chose was the Subashiri Trail, which was one of lesser travelled paths.

It should be noted that by this point we had tried to get information on trail conditions, but that information wasn't very forthcoming. I think it's because we asked huts on the mountain - afraid of giving us information we might poorly act on, even the place we had reservations at didn't say much of anything other than the Yoshida trail was the easiest to ascend. The weather report said that things would be fine, maybe some light rain in the night, but as we planned to be in a hut by then it really didn't bother us. The last thing to do was to leave our luggage in Tokyo with the hotel staff, and as we had a later reservation with them a day out, they were more than happy to watch over our luggage. Thus, our departure was taken care of.

We left the hotel at around 10:00, and stopped on the way at a convienience store. I got two big bottles of Pocari Sweat, the Japanese sport drink which pales in comparison to the varieties of flavors found in the US, and some rice balls for the first day. Another friend who had gone earlier left us with some granola bars and trail mix (really good to have with you), and thus prepared, we went to the JR Station. We were bound for Gotenba Station, and from there we were to catch a bus (operated by the Fujikyu Bus Group) to Subashiri 5th Station.

A word of warning to those of you who wish to follow in our footsteps: Gotenba lies outside the area where Suica can be used to pay. You can use it to get on the train in Tokyo, and you can change trains without leaving the terminal until you arrive, but when you arrive, you won't be able to pay the fare with it. They will reset your card, and they can use it to find out where you've come from, but I'm assuming for some sort of bureaucratic reason they can't accept payment from it, meaning you'll have to pay the fare in cash. When I went, it was a little less than 2000 yen.

When we arrived at Gotenba, we found the bus stop not far from the station exit, so getting our tickets hardly took any time at all. We got to the station at 12:00, so we decided to eat here (the right decision), and bought round-trip tickets leaving on the 13:30 bus. With our tickets in hand, we walked around aimlessly for a while trying to find something near the station. Most places were closed, and there was very little activity on the street, but we eventually came across a ramen/donburi place, and settled on that.

I regret being lazy about taking pictures in this place, because it was seriously the manliest ramen and donburi shop I've ever been to.

Their three commandments, displayed on a wall: "Big bowls, big voices, big satisfaction."
An ad in the restroom: "Shizuoka Boxing Gym: Men become stronger when they take it like men."
Their menu: Man Rice, Men's Fatty Pork Ramen. Sizes in Normal, Large, and Manly.

I took a bad photo (with copious amounts of zoom since I took it from the station) of part of the menu outside the store so you know I'm not making this up.

I'll have it be said that the portions were also American sized - one of us ordered the Fatty Pork Ramen, and was only able to finish half of it. The food was still good, and the price wasn't bad either, so all in all I'd say they lived up to their credo. We relaxed at the place for a while before we went out to catch our bus.

On the way to Subashiri, we noticed an inordinate number of military transport trucks on the highway - apparently the JSDF and the U.S. Marine Corps both operate bases at the foot of Mount Fuji. The road to the station will lead you past a military hospital run by the JSDF, and will eventually go the forest as it winds back and forth up the mountain.

Update, 18 August 2012: Forest was not Aokigahara, thankfully enough - the forest is on the other side of the mountain. You can still read about it here: (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aokigahara).

The bus made a few (very few, I think four) stops along the way. I didn't take many pictures of the scenery save for a shrine at the side of the road, and after an hour on the bus, our 2000 yen round-trip ticket finally took us to our destination, landing us at Subashiri 5th Station at around 14:30.