A meizanologist's diary (60)

15 March: some of the best trips happen at short notice. Yesterday, I was still on the train from Kansai International Airport when the email from Wes Lang came in: “Tomorrow I will climb Mt Hino (日野山) in Echizen city …” it read.

At the shrine

Now this was no ordinary invitation. Wes long ago climbed all of the One Hundred Mountains. And, more recently, he and co-author Tom Fay have published their magisterial guidebook to Hiking and Trekking: The Japan Alps and Mount Fuji. But what is he up to now? There was only one way to find out …

So, early on a Friday morning, the Sensei and I find ourselves walking into the precincts of the Hino shrine. Up ahead, Wes up seems to be setting up a tripod. “We’re afraid we’re going to hold you back,” I say. “Not to worry,” he replies, “I’m going to be making a video.”

Soon I understand the logic – while the Sensei and I make our leisurely way upwards, Wes, like a videographic Tigger, is effectively climbing the mountain twice, as he places his video camera on a tripod, runs on ahead of it to make the footage, and then runs back to pick up the gear and repeat. I had no idea that making a vlog is so vlabour-intensive …

Turns out that video is now Wes’s favoured means of mountain expression – on his YouTube site, you can find mini-documentaries on everything from hiking Nogō-Hakusan to eating dried persimmons (great hill food, by the way, but watch your teeth on the stones).

By the same token, updates on his Tozan Tales blogs are fewer: a man can’t be everywhere at once, especially if – like Wes – he is teaching at no fewer than three universities and helping to bring up a nine-year old daughter who seems to have inherited his high-energy genes.

But right now we are on Hino-san, and Wes has briefed himself well on the mountain's features. Indeed, like the well-known haiku blogger Matsuo Bashō, he caught sight of the mountain’s Fuji-like form on a previous trip to the Hokuriku region, and there and then resolved to come back and inspect it more closely.

Faito to the chojo ....

There should be plenty to inspect. Although Hino is hardly a fifth the height of Mt Fuji, the ascent path is divided into ten “stations”, just like those on Japan’s top Meizan. And each station is marked by a cheery sign hand-painted by the students of a local primary school, urging us to ganbare! or faito! Besides, Hino is said to afford a great view of Hakusan.

Encountering Fudo-myo-o at Murodo

We take a break at Hino’s Murodō, or intermediate shrine, which like the one on Hakusan is named for the pilgrim’s huts (“muro”) that once stood here. I take the chance to ask Wes where all this vlogging is going. The idea, he replies, is one video about a representative mountain in each of Japan’s 47 prefectures and administrative areas – how to climb them and what you’ll see there.

A-zero terrain on the west face of Mt Hino

Some muddy slabs, rigged with ropes, lead us up through Hino’s snowline. By the time we reach the summit shrine, we are crunching through a crusty old snow. It’s time to don our sunglasses; the glare has reached an almost alpine intensity.

Behind the summit sanctuary, we pay a visit to a mysterious modern monument to the pilgrims of old. Or perhaps the pilgrims of today – a plaque in the summit refuge hut celebrates a local man who ascended Hino 3,000 times in his bare feet.

A mysterious monument to mountain mystics

Sitting in the shrine's lee in the warm sun, we munch our lunchtime rice balls and try peering through the haze towards Hakusan. Alas, not even high-contrast sunglasses will penetrate the yellow dust from the continent. We’ll have to come back another day to patch in a view worthy of Wes's vlog ...

Gazing into the haze ...
(Photo by courtesy of Wes)