Our planned hike last month did not go according to plan. The weather had a big part to play in that. The hike that we originally had planned for September turned out to be a no go because of the weather. It would have been rainy and miserable if we went through with that plan. In fact all our back up plans that we made for September were a no.
I had stitches removed out of my knee the morning before the hike. Which is why we were trying to keep it fairly easy. I didn’t want to re-open the newly healed gash that I had put in my leg. So I did what any person would do in this situation. Instead of calling it quits on the hike , I started looking for alternatives.
I thought I had found the perfect hike. According to my hiking app, it was only going to be a five and half hour hike with less than 900 meters of elevation gain. A nice easy hike up to Mt. Kintoki in the Hakone area. The newbie hiker that I am, I thought that the up down , up down course of the hike would be easy because it was not a straight up hike. That might have been the case but we had to climb up steep stairs built into the path and over tree roots that were now exposed because of water run off.
Sunday morning we all woke up early, met at about 5:30 a.m. and set out just before 6 on what we thought was going to be a straight forward 3.5 hour drive to the trail head. I don’t know if any of you have ever driven through Tokyo on the expressway but it is crazy and a bit hard to navigate if you are not familiar with it. None of us were. Even following google maps was confusing at times.
With a few detours we finally made it to the trailhead only to find out the place we thought was a parking area was closed. Driving up further down the road we were hoping to find parking or a place to turn around.
We found parking and a clearly marked trailhead but it was not the trailhead that I originally had planned to start with, but it would take us Mt. Kintoki. We got out of the car, put our hiking shoes on, strapped our packs on our backs and got ready to set out on our hike!
I guess this would be a good time to mention the weather. It had definitely been raining that morning. The ground was wet, muddy and a bit slippery but the forecast was said it that it had stopped for the day. The clouds would continue to be there for the better part of the day, although there were times the clouds went away and the view was amazing.
Also can I just say to those who have been following our blog from the beginning, Whenever Mt. Fuji would appear from behind the clouds it just seemed to be mocking us. Saying “Haha, you were so close to the top but yet you were far away.” Challenge excepted, Mt. Fuji. We will see you next year!
We set out on our hike. It was about 20 minutes into our hike when we saw what we thought were signs of bears. Me being the only person with a bear bell was assigned to walk in front. It turned out to be a good thing though because not only was I the bear scarer but I was also the pace setter. This was probably because I had the shortest legs and heaviest pack of the group.
When we finally did run into some people further up the path they reassured us that they had not seen any bears and they had put us at ease. The longer we hiked the more people we saw. A lot of those people seeing a group of westerners decided to practice their English on us.
Except for one couple that we saw, who spoke to us in Japanese. They asked us how long each of us had been in Japan. With me being the longest person at 21 years, I proudly declared myself the winner. Then the husband spoke up and said they had been here longer than even me. They had emigrated from South Korea more than 30 years ago. We all had a nice laugh at that. After chatting for a bit more we all went on our separate ways.
All the hikers we met were coming from the opposite side. I think they may have been on to something. I pretty sure we had picked the hardest route up.It was slow going with all the steep stairs and tree roots that we had to climb up and over. We soon found out that this hike would take longer than five hours.
It was a beautiful hike though. Surrounded by nature on both sides of the trial with the occasional view of Mt. Fuji when the clouds decided to move out of the way. We saw cartoon looking mushrooms, that I still can’t believe are real. I knew they were poisonous but I just couldn’t help but wonder if I ate one would I suddenly grow super powers. Obviously I didn’t try any of them but still I couldn’t help but wonder.
The closer to the top the more people we ran into. When asked they had different ideas on how long it was to the top. We met one young foreign couple not really dressed for hiking, the guy told us it was only 5 minutes to the top but the girl insisted that it was more like 10 minutes. They were both wrong. It was more like 30 minutes to the top from where we met them on the trail. 20 minutes later we met another pair of foreign hikers that told us the summit was just ahead, only about 10 more minutes. They were more correct in their assessment of time. Amazing how time passes differently for different people.
We finally reached the top of Mt. Kintoki at about 1 pm. Not a minute too soon, all three of us were tired, hungry and ready for a break. It took us about 3 and a half hours to reach the top, an hour longer than we originally thought. We had long ago given up on the idea that it was only a 5 and half hour hike, reaching the top an hour later than planned confirmed this.
The top was winder than we expected but it was a welcome wind bringing in some coolness to the hot and humid day it was. Even at 1212 meter about sea level it wasn’t much cooler than the bottom of the mountain.
Mt. Kintoki is named after the Japanese version of Paul Bunion, Kintaro. Kintaro grew up on Mt. Kintoki doing sumo with bears, throwing boulders the size of small houses around and fighting demons. He also carried a huge axe, which is why there is a big axe at the top of the mountain. If you continue up the trail you can see his actual axe, or so the legend says.
Anyway I digress, back to our hike. After our lunch break and getting food in our bellies we started our hike back down. The hike down as it always is was much easier. I was once again elected pace setter. We now felt safe from bears, I only needed to worry about pace and not about wild animals.
I went slow on the descent only from fear of falling and re opening the gash on my leg. Honestly I was afraid I had already did on some of the steep steps already. I had put gauze, a bandage and sports tape over it just in case. I took it as a good sign that I didn’t see any blood on the sports tape,
The way back was fairly uneventful, except that the boys didn’t exactly believe that we were still going the right direction. I was in charge of the map and didn’t exactly invoke confidence in them with my poor navigation skills attributing to one or two of our detours to the trailhead that morning.
It is a good thing that I kept insisting that I was correct because 7 hours and 46 minutes after we started our hike we arrived back at the car. Reaching the car when we did was perfect timing because not only had the sun already started to descend but all three of us had run out of water.
Tired and sore, we headed home. We got stuck in two traffic jams on the way back but eventually we made it safely to our cars at about 10:30 pm. To say the hike didn’t go according to plan is an understatement. But we learned that we need to over estimate the predicted time of hikes and maybe not hike the day after you get stitches out of your knee. But honestly it was FUN! What is a hike without challenges and surprises anyway?
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