Anyway, the first thing that worried me was that the website claimed that 2.5 million people visited the mountain each year, which works out to almost 7 000 people a day...which would make for a shitty hike. From what I could tell though, it seemed like a lot of those people came in the Spring for the Cherry blossoms or the Fall for the foliage. So far so good.
There's a nice express train that got me there from downtown Tokyo, and when I got off, a second thing worried me: lots of other people got off. There were definitely lots of people around...and gift shops...and so on. I grabbed a map and noticed that there was a cable car and several different hiking trails to the top, some of which were not accessible if you took the car part way up. I assumed most people would be taking this car, so I decided to take the trails that had nothing to do with that goofy thing. Here is a picture of the cable car that I didn't take:
Taking the road less traveled turned out to be a good idea, as it usually is. The trail up, which took me about an hour and twenty minutes or so, was not packed. It was definitely busier than this Canadian boy is used to, but it wasn't bad. It was also quite beautiful, with a stream running beside you the whole time and some massive trees.
The hike down a different, but also not accessible by the lazy masses, trail was similarly beautiful and had a similar not-all-that-ridiculous number of people on it.
The peak itself was where everyone eventually ended up. The view of some of the other parts of the range from here was pretty stellar.
However, the peak also had tonnes of people everywhere, was completely paved, had several gift shops and restaurants and...oh wait for it...yah wait for it some more...a beer garden! Seriously, there was a lot of beer going on up there. Big glass mugs and plenty of people walking around with cans, often smoking as well.
Also, lots of people decided to picnic up there. While the view was good from where I took the previous picture, there wasn't much else to see. There were a lot of trees up there preventing you from seeing much. So what you ended up having were people on tarps sitting on pavement surrounded by other people on tarps sitting on pavement while people walked all around them all the time, having picnics! I was sitting on a bench drinking some water when all of a sudden the people on a tarp next to me lit up a gas camping stove, put a pot of water on it, and made noodles!
In general, at least on the trails I took, my fellow hikers were very very polite and most were taking it pretty seriously. When passing other hikers, a polite "konichiwa (hello)" was usually exchanged. I even exchanged a konichiwa with another white guy! One hiker was so polite that when he saw me taking pictures, he offered to take mine. He told me to say cheese ("cheezu" in Japanese) AFTER he had already taken the picture, but that's beside the point.
I also scored some sweet views of the sprawl beneath me on the way down. I could see Tokyo and Yokohama skyscrapers in the distance, but unfortunately due to the humidity they didn't really come out in the pictures I took. If you look REAL hard, you might be able to see them in the gray...
When looking at those pictures, remember that I am about 50 minutes by express train from the closest major downtown core of Tokyo. The dense urban sprawl literally occupies all available space, although out here at least some houses had little yards.
I would like to close this post with some things that annoyed me (besides everything on the peak), because that's what you're all here for anyway isn't it? A nice rant? Here we go...
I saw three idiots on the trails on their cellphones. THREE. Some people brought their kids, and one was screaming and hollering and I had to pass them and really kick it up a notch to get out of ear shot as fast as possible. That really got my heart racing. Further along I ended up behind someone with a bell attached to his bag. A little bell that ding-a-ling-a-linged multiple times every step. Who in this world decides to go on a nature hike with a ridiculously annoying bell attached to his bag?! I found a place to pass this guy and again kicked it up a notch to get out of ear shot. Come to think of it, the best work-outs of the day were when I was escaping from people who were being annoying. Ah well, the trails were beautiful and in the end that's all that really matters.
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