2010.09.06 / 12.8km / 9:31 hours / 1567 meters
I thought 3 liters would be enough for another +30C day. In the end I ran out of 2/3 of my water halfway up, so I bought a small bottle at the yama-goya atop Hakkaisan. It should be more than enough for the down, I told myself.
Hah.
2010.06.25 / 11.5km / 4:53 hours / 899 meters We see Iijisan from our Yuzawa home almost everyday. One day in June, we had decided to climb from the very bottom, starting from the fishing park. We would go up what’s called the Jinbei-course, ultimately winding along a nokogiri, or saw-toothed, ridgeline. We had looked …
2010.08.26 / 11.2km / 4:37 hours / 1073 meters Helpful items for hiking Tairappyo in August: 1. water, lots of it 2. rainwear 3. something to let the tsukiwaguma bear living around Matsuteyama know you’re there* *and yes, it is a big one
2010.08.21 / 21km / 13:47 hours / 2193 meters It was a sweltering +32C down in Yuzawa, but Izumi and I had to put on our rainwear to deal with the freezing winds atop Mantaro. The rest of the hike is a long blur, almost already forgotten. I do recall, however, that my boots finally …
2010.08.30 / 8.6km / 6:50 hours / 1071 meters Simply put, this mountain knocked me on my ass. +30C. 1071m vert. Steep and sauna-like. It was like a bigger version of Yuzawa’s Daigenta. I’ll never make fun of a 1300m-class mountain ever again.
2010.5.1 Harinoki 13.6 km / 7:38 hours / 1,363m I stood alone atop Harinoki, imagining a line down the mountain. A few friends – Fukazu-san, Hasegawa-san – had the knack to see beyond the fall-line.
2010.4.24 Yarisawa 24 km / 15:46 hours / 1,521m I stared at the GPS tracks and tallied up the numbers: Day 1: 11.6 km to Yoko campsite Day 2: 11.7 km to Obamidake, descent, 6.3 km from Yarisawa-lodge to Yoko campsite Day 3: 11.6 km back to trailhead Total: 3 days and 41 km to …
2010.3.19 Bunodake, Hinokimata Valley 16.1 km / 10:12 hours / 1,537m “Joji, ii ne!” Fukazu-san pointed to the couloir across the way. There were several. Izumi and I asked him twice to make sure we were talking about the same route. In Fukazu-speak, more often than not, good meant steep. It was one of several …
2010.2.21 Nishizen 19.1 km / 9:12 hours / 1,053m She slipped and stuttered and into the water – do-bon. An echo hung in the air.