Fun in Summer

It's summer season in Japan, meaning mostly one thing - it's hot and freaking humid! I had heard about the humid climate before, but I didn't really believe it would be that bad before I had experienced it myself. By now I've almost gotten used to starting to sweat after only a few steps outside, and I'm not exaggerating..

On the upside, there are many fun traditions and activities during the Japanese summer that easily make up for the climate. One funny custom that I recently learned about is using bamboo slides along which cold noodles are flowing, one has to catch the noodles with chopsticks and dip them in some kind of sauce before eating.

Another nice thing are the plentiful nice (though a little crowded) beaches that are easily accesible from anywhere, since most of the cities are located near the sea. For instance, we had our summer retreat with the church on a beautiful location near the beach:

Last but not least, there are many cool festivals and fireworks taking place during summer season! Today I want to share pictures of the "Gion Matsuri", one of the 3 most famous summer festivals throughout Japan. Gion Matsuri's history dates back to the 9th century. It is celebrated in Kyoto throughout the month of July, it's most spectacular event being the parade of 32 floats, as can be seen below. One interesting fact is that the bigger floats have no mechanism for making a turn, that is, they can only go straight. That's why, in order to make them turn, they lay out wet bamboo on the street, move the floats on top of the bamboo, and then force them to turn by using lots of manpower.

Mount Fuji

Last weekend, the chance had finally come to pursue an endeavor that I had long wished to: Climbing Japan's highest mountain, Mt. Fuji (which in Japanese is called Fuji-san, NOT Fuji-yama!).
The near-perfectly shaped mountain, at 3776 meters, is quite majestic, being the only noteworthy elevation in its surrounding flatland. No wonder it is subject of countless tales and legends and has become an almost mythical symbol of Japan. While probably more astonishing from afar than close-up, we, that is 4 Germans, 1 Japanese, 1 Chinese-American, and 1 Indonesian, set out to conquer the mountain. The plan was to reach the summit at sunrise. This is our story.

Five of us took the night bus from Osaka to arrive near Mt Fuji Friday morning where we were supposed to meet the others. After some wait and confusion, we found out that there were actually two stations with almost the same name, Fuji-san-eki, and Fuji-eki. And that we had been waiting at both stations, which are more than 4 hours apart, on opposite sides of the volcano! This meant we were already late before even having started to climb, but we made the best of our situation and went on a little road-trip while waiting for the others to arrive. There are several scenic spots for viewing Mt. Fuji, here are some pictures:

In the late afternoon, we were finally eager and ready to go. We took the bus up to an elevation of about 2300 meters, bought some last supplies (snacks, drinks, and postcards), and off we went. The beginning of the hike went rather smoothly, without any major difficulties. We reached our mountain hut surprisingly fast, it took probably less than 2 hours. The staff was very friendly, one lady even spoke a little English. After eating our curry-dinner, the plan was to sleep for about 5 hours and then continue our hike again. However, this plan didn't work out very well since it was still early evening and none of use was able to sleep for more than an hour. So, we just rested a bit, and then took off around midnight.

By now the weather had gotten considerably worse: It got fairly cold, but even worse, it had started to rain and storm. Along with the fact that we couldn't see much with our tiny flash lights, and the terrain got more difficult, this made for quite an adventure. It was very slippery, so we couldn't proceed very fast. As we were ascending, the weather continued to get worse, until after several hours we finally decided to seek shelter in another mountain hut. Here, we were told that it was to dangerous to proceed to the summit just yet, because of heavy winds and snow! They said we shouldn't try to go up there and see the sunrise. Fortunately this hut belonged to the same owner as the hut before, so we were considered their guests and welcome to sleep there without further charge.

We woke up around 8 the next morning, to find out that while our clothes had not dried at all, the rain had stopped. Occasionally the clouds would even clear up, allowing us to enjoy a breath-taking view, as well as to take some pictures:

Although the wind was still very cold, especially given our wet clothes, we decided to begin our final ascend. According to the signs, it was just over 1 km to the top. This didn't sound too bad, but was actually very misleading, as it still took about 2.5 hours to finally get there! As we got closer to the summit, it got colder, the path got narrower, and also for some reason the crowds got bigger. At the end we even had to wait in line for a little while, but then we finally reached the top! The view was truly magnificent up there, it didn't matter that it was partially cloudy. Also, we had a chance to look at the crater:

I should also mention how it came to the last picture: Before our ascend, we were at a restaurant, where a drunk guy apparently thought we could need some shavers. So, he went to a store, bought an electric shaver for each of us, and just gave them to us! Of course we all had our own shavers with us, so the best use we could think of was to take this picture at the top!

In any way, there is less to say about the way back down. It went considerably faster, although I would say that in the end it was much harder on my legs than going up. We arrived back at the fifth station in afternoon. It was a Saturday, and we were surprised about the big crowds coming towards us. So I concluded it was a very good decision to choose a Friday for climbing up, not a Saturday!

After all, it was a very memorable trip. As they say, every person should climb Mt Fuji once in their lives, but only a fool would do it twice!

An Afternoon at Lake Biwa

Today's blog entry is about our trip to Lake Biwa two weeks ago. It was a very nice trip to a beautiful lake on a sunny but not too hot day, the perfect way to spend a Sunday afternoon! I had wanted to go there for some time but never had quite the right opportunity, so I gladly agreed to join some friends for the trip. Lake Biwa is about 2 hours from Osaka, and it's the largest lake in Japan, so it really feels more like being at the sea than being at a lake. There is not a lot to write about because we really didn't do a lot: After finding a good picnic spot on the beach, we enjoyed our lunchboxes which we had bought in Osaka, and spend the rest of the afternoon chatting, sun-bathing, and flipping stones..

Golden Week Pt III - The City of Okayama

The last day of our Golden Week was dedicated to the city of Okayama itself. It may not be so big and exciting, but it does have a nice castle with a very beautiful and big garden next to it.
The castle was built in the 16th century, and it's also called the "crow castle" because of its black appearance. I thought it looked kind of cool like this. Inside was a decent Samurai exhibition. Here are a few pictures:

Even more interesting than the castle was the "Korakuen" park which is located directly next to the castle. This is rather famous throughout Japan, and has small ponds, hills, creeks, cherry and maple trees, as well as lots of flowers, all in a very quiet and peaceful environment. Definitely a good conclusion of our trip!

Golden Week Pt II - Of Caves and islands, too many bridges, and not enough bikes

After our cultural explorations on the first day, on days 2 and 3 we set out to experience some of the beautiful nature around Okayama. The first trip was to a cave called "ikurado", in fact quite a big cave. Or maybe I should better say "long", because parts were really narrow, which quickly reminded me of the disadvantages of being a western guy: my body size! Our friend Keiko-san also joined us on this day, and even drove us around with her car. This made it easy to visit two other quite remarkable spots: One of the nice Okayama beaches, and also a viewpoint on top of a mountain, from which we could see the bay, including the big bridge leading to Shikoku (the smallest of Japan's 4 major islands). A tasty Sushi dinner concluded this day nicely.

The next day, our plan was to travel to Onomichi (1 hour from Okayama) for biking. Onomichi is starting point of an "island road", meaning a series of small islands that are connected by bridges, ultimately connecting the main island Honshu with Shikoku. The islands and also the bridges have trails made specifically for the purpose of biking, so I thought this sounded like a good plan. The only thing I had forgotten about was that it was Golden Week, and we were not the only people having had this idea. So, when we got there, all the rentable bikes were already gone.. Having learned about this, we decided not to let this ruin our day, and went on to explore one of the islands by ferry and bus. The island was an extremely quiet place, I almost couldn't believe this was still Japan. We visited two places here: A quite nice flower garden, but more impressively a small castle at the very top of the mountain. What made the castle special was its completely being embedded within wild nature, quiet different from the castles I had visited before.

Golden Week Pt. I - Kurashiki

Two weeks ago, Japan was celebrating what is called the "Golden Week": A series of 4 holidays that are not really related to each other, but happen to fall within one week. By taking just a couple days of paid time off, many Japanese make this their longest time off in the year. As for myself and Kayo, we just stuck with the regular holidays, and used the chance to spend four days in and around Okayama. Okayama-city lies in a less populated area, and as it turned out, a place like this is a smart choice for spending one's Golden Week. The reason: Around Golden Week, all of Japan's major places are just packed with people! Knowing how busy places like Osaka or Tokyo are on "normal" weekends, I really didn't want to experience it on Golden Week... Okayama was also busy of course, but still felt somehow relaxing. The plan for the first day was a visit to the nearby Kurashiki for its very beautiful historic town. Traditional white wooden houses are arranged along a small Koi-inhabitated river, and there are plenty of small shops selling hand-crafted Japanese goods. Well, you can see for yourself in these pictures:

One more thing that's worth noting was a wedding ceremony on the river, which looked quite extraordinary (I first thought it was acted, but apparently it was real). Unfortunately I didn't get a good view of it, but at least you can see the bride from the side: