Racing Mount Ooyama

Tonight will be going to meet with friends so couldn't go that far. I had opted for Mount Ooyama for todays target. Some more mountain climbing fun! Target would be bit over 1200 meters making it tallest mountain for me to climb. Waking up bright and early got to foot of the mountain well ahead of schedule.

Today at the 7-eleven lottery actually won something usable :D Extra bottle of green tea. Climbing is thirsty business so didn't mind having extra can just in case.

 From bus station to cable car station was narrow pathway going on through smallish town. Also lots of souvenir shops of course.

 On stairs there was occasionally notes or like this quiz! The plate I remember most was "you are at half-way. Keep going!".

 And there's the answer to above quiz.

 Some red visible :)

 I had opted to bypass the cable car(more by accident actually. Saw cable car station but couldn't figure pathway there. Maybe I took wrong course somewhere) but that's only small rise that it bypasses anyway. I can do it on foot!

This far you could get by cable car more or less. Next came the REAL climb toward the top which plate said "90" minutes. I decided to try to do it in 60.

 Start was simple enough. Nice stone stairs.

 With statues like this.

 And...something like that! Wonder what the purpose is?

 More temples on the way.

 Small statues! One like that would be very nice at home but while I'm sure you can buy something that looks similar I bet it's a) expensive b) pain in the ass to get to Finland!

 Getting bit more complicated here.

 STEEP!

 Ah red colours are so nice here.

 This is starting to get tricky. Those pathways were often full of roots and loose rocks. Rocks are particularly bad as they can slip below you causing risk of falling up. With self-imposed time limit I was racing up pretty fast overtaking Japanese regularly. Albeit we ARE talking of group composed of mainly middle-aged women so hardly most impressive feat :D I figured out during climbing why it's always middle aged women that are main group on mountains etc. Not sign of aging Japan or lack of interest to these activity but simply that younger women and especially men are at work and these are from the generation where it was customary for women to get married, get babies and with that quit work. Now kids are at school/work so they have likely lots of free time. What better way to spend it than go for hiking with friend or two?

Climbing up I kept hearing "aa gaijin-san!"(oh foreigner), "hayai"(fast) and "ganbare!"(keep it up!). This actually worked as good motivator. Having just overtaken them with high speed would be embarrassing to suddenly lose the momentum so I forced myself to at least get out of sight before possible exhaustion. Except then came next group and some more "ganbare!"'s making me to go the loop...AGAIN! :D Well at least this helped me to climb faster!

 Yeah that's steep climb upward. And that's the simple one...

 Yet another group I had caught up with. Realized quickly why so much people were gathering here.

Fujisan! Mount Fuji was well visible here. YAHHOO!

But still needed to keep going. Top would be about another 600 meters ahead. GO GO GO!

 Watch...the...lose...rocks. Those were bummer.

 See the torii gate and you know you are closing up to something!

 THE TOP! Yahhoo! But I failed with my goal. 65 minutes. BUMMER! Well at least did beat the aproximate time and with clear margin.

Ooo I was so in love with the view.

 Hadn't had actually time to eat much of a breakfast except for nikuman and melon bread. HAD bought breakfast but every time I got to station train came up and didn't want to wait for next one. By the time I had arrived to bus stations end it was cold. So at the top bought myself curry&rice plus can of cola.

 I was about to head to wrong direction to some other side of the mountain. Dunno how I would have got home from there but luckily verified from older men I had caught up. Whoops! With this I opted to play it safe and head home same route back that I had just climbed. Boring but safe.

Soon after starting descent veritable tide of kids came up. Wow. I asked one of the adults is this kindergarden and was told yeah. 6 year olds. Whee. Wouldn't have been able to climb to 1200m+ place when I was 6 year(nevermind the problem that there isn't even quarter of that where I live :D). That was impressive and the kids didn't even seem that tired. I think I was huffing more than they!

After continuing descent I knew exact moment kids reached the top. From behind steady "YAHHOOO!" started to sound up :D Kids are kids! Hahaha.

 Couple details I had missed on my mad rush to top. Well I can always see them on my way back down I guess ;)

 On the route I was practically dragged inside restaurant and given free cup of tea. Was I THAT exhausted looking? Well kind enough that I figured I would order something and it's not like I wasn't still hungry. Opted for "nikujaga" which I'm told is very popular basic food in Japanese often eaten in home. Above was something I got before main meal came up. Not quite sure what. Taste reminded me oddly of something in Finland but still can't point my finger at it.

 And that's the nikujaga. Except for noodles very similar to meat-soup actually both in ingredients and taste.

For dessert opted for mix of vanilla-chocolate softcream.

Trip back was even less eventful than trip here as now I knew how to do it. I was even able to read train map enough to realize fastest way is not to take same trains but midroute switch to the fastest train line, overshoot target station, switch again train and go back to the target station.

 Current manga series I'm reading is "uchuu kyoudai"(space brothers) taking place in 2025 I think(or was it 2028). Laughed out loud when I saw that "rocky 12" movie :D Wonder how old Stallone would be at that time?

Looks pretty old at least :D

Getting off from train and preparing to switch to line that then would take me all the way to home spotted yet another book off ad so went there and found out even bigger than yesterdays. Yey! This even has uchuu kyoudai in full(unlike last one) so guess I know where to come to fill up as I read them. Or before departure to fill up any remaining space.

Tomorrow will be heading toward Nagano and Jigokudani. Likely no blog post then so 'till sunday.