Konichiwa!

Whenever we talked about Japan we talked about hiking Mt. Fuji. Of course we would never just go for the "boring" dayhike, we were talking about the night hike to reach the summit just in time for the sunrise. In the past week we talked with a few different people in our hostels who did the same hike just recently. To be quite honest, some of the stories about extremely cold weather, wind, rain, a s***ty sunrise due to clouds and altitude sickness, made us a little worried but could not tame our enthusiasm.

Fully prepared with water, plenty of food, all the warm cloths we had (hiking pants, leggins, tank top, t-shirt, long sleeves, hoodie, rain jacket and hat) and gloves "backpacker-style" ("grandma's selfmade cotton socks will do!") we left Tokyo via bus at 5:50pm.

We reached Mt. Fuji's 5th station completely motivated at 8:10pm. After a quick washroom and post card shopping break we were ready to leave at 8:45pm. Fuji-san is in total 3776 meters high and the 5th station is located 2304 meters above sealevel. That left us with 1472 meters elevation gain in 6km and 8 hours until sunrise - no big deal we thought!!!

The first part from 5th to 7th station felt extremly easy; we had a steady pace and thanks to the Canadian winter we felt perfectly comfortable in 12 degrees. Many people made their way up to the summit and all we could see in this clear night was the almost full moon and the sea of lights (from the flashlights) when looking up and down - Magical!

Between 7th and 8th station are a lot of huts located for hikers to rest, warm up or buy refreshments. During these 2 stations it was extremely busy with large groups and the single lined trail made it hard to get past them. We managed and were ahead of them after a little set-back. Just before 8th station it became windy and the temperature had dropped to 2 degrees only. In addition to the colder weather, we started to feel light headed and slightly sick to our stomach - the first signes of altitude sickness. We never really put much thought into altitude sickness and oxygen bottles but after this hike we learned to take it more seriously. Not wanting to go into any details, we can say that without the oxygen bottle of a nice lady (who we can not thank enough) we would not have made it to the summit in time. It seemed we all were part of one big team with the same destination - seeing the sunrise; this is what kept us going!

Completely frozen and altitude sick, we arrived at the summit just in time and were rewarded with the most breathtaking sunrise we have ever seen. It was worth all the effort and pain and no picture in the world can capture the stunning views we were able to witness and how blessed we felt (even though we tried hard).

During the 3 hour hike back to the 5th station in nicer and warmer climate we could see for the first time the scenery around us!

WE MADE IT!!! Happy to have been so lucky in many ways (weather, lifesafer, etc.), we are proud of ourselves and don't regret a single moment of this special experience.

Cheerio, Ann & Sabrina