JAPANEXILE

oteizan, standing at around 1900m is the tallest mountain/volcano in western Hokkaido. I had been intending to climb Yotei from the moment I saw it, originally with the intention of snowboarding down it, unfortunately my winter fun plans were foiled by work commitments (not mine - rather the experienced partner I was to be going with). The views are still pretty spectacular (I assumed) in the summer though, and you can get up to the top without contracting hyperthermia which would be possible in the deep of winter. So, my last weekend in Hokkaido, Hiro and I set of for Yotei, parked the car and made our ascent. Views on the way up were pretty amazing when the cloud mercifially broke for us. It took us 3.5hrs of hard climbing to reach the 9th station, where we found a big group of fellow climbers staying the night there. After a quick beer we had taken the effort to bring with us it was off for an early night, since the sunrise would be at 4.05am and we still had to get to the summit. It started getting light about 3:30pm and the hike to the summit was pretty short if clumsily done without the aid of a torch. Hiro and I walked between the two big craters on the summit and headed for the east to watch the sunrise in all its glory. Although due to the cloud cover we could see bugger all of the world below us, we were at least above the clouds which is always cool.

Sunrise came and everyone there furiously took photos, myself included, at verying shutter speeds as I didn’t really know which to use. The results are below, quite pleased with some of them. Once the sun had come up proper we made the rather difficult circuit over the rocks around the rim of the crater and headed back down the mountain. Going down is almost as hard as going up, as its more attempting to control your fall rather� than walk, to the effect that you run down it whilst trying not to slip/tumble over. Good fun actually, if painful on the old knees. There were lots of people coming on the other way, all of whom you have the same conversation with as you pass them “Whats the view like?” “Did you stay up there the night before?” etc etc.

2 hours later we we home free. And me now with every intention of coming back in winter to board down. Can’t describe how awesomely fun it looks!