Here we are, (insert place name here), 2007, Part 1.

Ok so here's the belated run down of an 8 day road trip 2k7, where me, Micky and Fern totally smashed Mt Fuji, then tore it up in Tokyo, Kobe and Hiroshima on the way home.

Part 1 - Embarkation
Tuesday Night, July 31st 2007.

So I knocked off work at 21:00 and hurried home to load up the car. Micky and Fern were at the apartment ready to roll, after a quick change of clothes we jumped into the freshly hired Mazda Demio ready to smash Mt Fuji. PRTE^ levels were pretty high, everyone was looking forward to travelling halfway across Japan. As you can see, Chuck Norris beard levels were also pretty up there.

I took the first driving shift, and after half an hour on the local roads we made it to the expressway, where we would be spending a lot of time and doing a lot of k's. After a couple of hours it was time for a driver change, so I jumped in the back, spread out (as much as you can in a hatchback, anyway) and grabbed some z's. Fern took the next shift followed by Micky, and we kept going in this fashion - stopping every couple of hours for a new driver, food run or toilet break. The Japanese expressways are pretty sweet, albeit pricey. Every 40km's or so there's a convenience store and petrol station, so once you're on, there's no need to get off until you get to your destination.
As the hours clicked by so did the k's, and we found ourselves covering some decent ground. The night drive was pretty uneventful, although it was pretty cool cruising on the highway as the sun came up.


After 11 hours on the road we clocked over the 1000km mark, and thinking it was a significant achievement I tried to video the odometer as it ticked over. To my dismay, the odometer only has three digits, which I didn't realise, so after 999 it reset to zero. I was NOT HAPPY at all and a few very harsh expletives were bandied around the car to express this.

Soon enough the object of our mission loomed in front of us, it was great to see the mountain after being on the road for such a long time. The weather was perfect and we were treated to some pretty spectacular views of Fuji.


It was cheers all round as the exit off the expressway rolled up, with the toll for our little journey coming to approximately $220 (aussie) big ones.


Nevertheless, thumbs up cos we'd put the majority of the trip behind us.

The last 50k's was done at a snail's pace because every Japanese family and their toy dogs were day tripping from Tokyo cos of the school holidays, but we got there in the end.
At 13:09 we rocked up at the hostel: 15 hours and 1167 kilometres later, concluding that Mt Fuji is a lllooooonnnnggggg way from Kumamoto. Happy that we made it in one piece.

The afternoon was spent walking around the scenic town of Kawaguchi-ko, at the foot of Mt Fuji. We were pretty stuffed from the all night/all morning drive, so took it pretty easy.
Here's a couple of happy snaps.



That evening we went out to a charming little Italian restaurant overlooking the lake and the lights of the town for dinner. It was quite a romantic little spot, and surprisingly the three of us were still talking to each other after spending so long cooped up together in the mazda box.
Alarmingly, this wasn't to be the last of the romantic activities completed on the trip, and set the scene for what would later become known as the 'Triangle de Love'.

Post dinner we headed back to the hostel to try and get a decent nights sleep, as the plan was to hit the mountain the next day. We planned to start late in the afternoon, climb during the night and reach the summit for sunrise. However the question then arose - "Where do we start from?". Normal people catch a bus up to the 5th station, and then do the 5 hr hike to the top from there. But after a quick discussion, we came to the obvious conclusion that no, we're not normal, we're fucken' dangerous, plus tough as nails, so we made the call to start from the Sengen Shrine, at the very bottom of the mountain. It would add approximately 5 hours to the trek, but Micky 'The Enforcer' was keen to do it as he'd come all the way from Oz, so we thought what the hell, if we're going to do it, let's do it properly.
I asked one girl at the hostel where she was starting from, to which she said 'the fifth station, where else is there?' so when I told her that we were going to do it from the bottom, her reply was a simple, yet slightly sarcastic, 'good luck'. Yeah, it's sometimes tough being this hardcore, normal people often get jealous.

So we hit the bunk beds at the hostel, which by the way is one of the best hostels I've stayed at (http://kshouse.jp/fuji-e/index.html) in order to rest up, however PCE* was way too high to sleep. This was compounded by the fact that in our room was one of the biggest tools I've ever met, who would just not shut up. This guy had no idea. Now, I know I often joke about being dangerous and stuff, but that's all it is - a joke. This guy however, had no clue. He was coming out with quotes like "I've been training for this climb for like six years". Skahill's asked "what training have you done?", and he replied "I climb mountains in America without any safety gear".
We asked him how dangerous he was, to which he replied "Well, I want to go scuba diving with sharks. How dangerous does that make me?". Ummm, not very.
After taking the piss out of him for about an hour, we eventually had to tell him to shut the fuck up or he's gunna cop it, which quietened him down a bit, and we all settled in for a bit of sleep before the big day.

^PRTE: Pre road trip excitement
*PCE: Pre climb excitement

Next episode: The Ascent.