Day 12 - Descending Mount Fuji

We woke up at around 12:30 to continue our hike to the summit. We had about 900 meters of trail left (about 150 m in terms of altitude). It was extremely windy and foggy. Despite having a headlamp, I wasn't able to see more than a couple of feet in front of me. Then flurries started to occur, which made it even more treacherous than before. Progress was slow, but we made it to the top in about 1.5 hours or so. 

When we arrived at around 2 AM, the wind at the top was so fierce, that I had troubles keeping my ground. We eventually found a place where the wind wasn't as bad, but it was dreadfully cold still (even though temperatures were probably above zero still). I had a windbreaker on and multiple layers of clothes/pants/socks, yet I felt like I was going to get frostbite again on my toes!

After some time, we saw more and more people coming to the top. At around 3:30, the horizon was starting to turn red. By about 4:00, the entire horizon was orange-red. It was a beautiful sight. 

Then, when the sun rised at around 4:35, you can hear a whole bunch of cheers for the goraiko (I think that's the proper term for the sunrise). Our group took a couple of pictures, then we turned towards the descending trail to go back down. 

The descent wasn't as physically demanding as the climb, but it was still quite difficult. It was really hard not to slip on the gravel on the way down. I did end up slipping and scraping up my right knee, but I was more concerned about my right pinkie toe (my right leg suffered quite a lot of minor damage during the climb and descent). It was starting to hurt a lot from me going downhill while making a "hockey stop" with my right foot to prevent me from tripping as I went down. 

Eventually, we made it to the 6th station and the rest of the trip went pretty smoothly. The walk to the 5th was quite delightful, when compared to the foggy encounter we had the day before. 

Upon arrival at the 5th station, we took a 2 hour and 20 monte bus ride to Shinjuku station. When we rechecked in at our hotel, we did our laundry and pretty much fell asleep for the afternoon/night. 

And that marked the most epic part of my journey! The rest will be to shop and to visit some of my relatives in Japan! It's hard to believe that my trip is coming to a close, but I have to admit that I'm missing Calgary at the moment =\.