|
Great Escapes | Hiking Fuji Five Lakes | (Entered May. 01, 2009) |
Recent Great Escapes: | |||
This trip almost didn't happen due to my indecision about whether it was something I really wanted to do. What I wanted in a nutshell was to get out of Tokyo, someplace where I could commune with nature, someplace where the number of humans besides myself was either nil or countable on one hand, someplace I could go and come back from in one day, without spending a lot of money, during golden week.... Basically I wanted the impossible. However it certainly seemed better than the alternative of spending another whole day indoors on my own during that very brief period of the year when Tokyo's weather is actually decent (the period sometimes referred to as spring). The first stop was a little lookout called koyodai, which I got to in a matter of minues. Happily I was the only one there, and got out the D80 for a few Fuji pics. My second stop of the day was another viewpoint called sankodai (three lakes view), which was probably the best of the three viewpoints I visited as the viewing area was very large and gave you perhaps a good 180 degree unrestricted vantage of the surrounding countryside, which was beautiful indeed. The area was large enough for a whole high school of kids to have a picnic on, and when I arrived I was dismayed to find exactly that. I wasn't at all taken aback though, Japan has ceased to surprise me in matters of crowdedness. I looked at my map, and decided the best way to escape the mayhem was to hike up to the highest point in the hopes that most people would pass it up in favour of easier spots, and I was right, well briefly that is. After a fairly grueling hike (for me) of about one hour, I reached the top of Mr. Ashiwada and for about 5 minutes I had it to myself. The area was also called 'five lakes view', but all the lakes were hidden by trees. Only Mt. Fuji was visible above the treetops. The same view from the top of Mt. Ashiwada using my 80-200mm lens. I actually have climbed Mt. Fuji once, but it was years previous to this website's creation. After waiting out the 2 couples, I spent a bit more time in solitude before heading back the way I'd come. I thought I'd head back to the previous lookout and see if all the high school kids were gone, and then after that I wanted to go down for a look at Saiko lake. A token bokeh shot taken on the hiking path with my 50mm prime lens. And they were gone! I spent a few happy minutes in peace before I was once again interrupted by the smoking couple again. Somehow I'd gotten ahead of them on the trail. It was about 5pm now and I still wanted to get to the bottom of the lake for some photos before the sun went down, so I headed through the sea of trees trail (story above) but it ended up being much longer than I anticipated, so instead of heading for the town on the left corner of lake Saiko (see map) I instead made a beeline to a closer town. It ended up being a wise move. When I got to the main road and checked a bus timetable, I discovered that the last bus for Kawaguchiko station would be arriving in a couple of minutes. Had I missed it I might've had to spend the night in this tiny, empty and almost unnervingly quiet town with only a bit of trail mix for dinner. |
Hakodate - Day 3
|
|||||
|
|