Forest of Monsters and Suicides, Fuji

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Just a brief blog, from Kyoto.

Tuesday. I arrived at a small town at the base of Mt. Fuji. Benjamin to follow on Wednesday morning, so we can climb to the fifth station on Mt Fuji and also explore a dark, suicidal forest at its base.

Tuesday night. The lodge we'd booked turns out to be a weird, dog-ridden, over-priced, germ infested hole. I arrive there at 8 pm, by 9 pm I am dismayed and running along dark, freezing Fuji roads to find a public phone booth. I am slightly disturbed by the strange staff at Dog Lodge. By 10 pm I have found a resort, checked in there (booking a room for B.T. tomorrow night), and checked out of Dog Lodge with a refund of half my money (I wasnt going to argue for anything more).

Wednesday. Ben finds all of the transport pre-booked, and arrives later than expected. We decide to ditch Fuji and concentrate on the spooky forest of Jyukai. We look at maps, ask people, no one will tell us, really, how to get to a trail which will head into this forest. Thanks to Ben's Japanese-fu we jump on a bus which is heading somewhere near the trail going into this black, dense, deathly forest. Alighting from the bus we spend an hour trying to discover where the trail begins. We ask an elderly Japanese gentleman driving past where the trail begins. He tells us not to go in, that it's 'very dangerous'.

When you think about it, putting the superstition attached with the place aside, we know it is dangerous. B.T. had found a picture of a corpse found hanging there the previous week. The image he found on the internet news site had blanked out the corpse, leaving a sort of murder scene, chalked outline of a human figure dangling by a noose. If we meet someone on this path, we don't know what to expect from them. And perhaps there's a something ... (no, not really, I'm not superstitious, but the place was spooky).

We are walking along it, being a bit freaked out, at 4 pm. The sun goes down at 5 pm, we make sure we are out by 4:45 pm, waiting for a bus to get us back.

A very strange, Mirkwood experience. The wood was very thick, with thin, spindly trunks (I expected the black-trunked trees of the north). Paths ran deeper into the woods, we only went a little way in. There was a strange compulsion to follow those paths, but knowing that there wasn't much sunlight left, I was careful about ensuring we were out while it was still light and were still in one piece.

I suppose I am a bit sorry that I didn't get to climb Fuji, but I leave a bit satisfied by my failure to do so, anyhow. It is like leaving a sense of wistfulness behind, especially after feeling a little ashamed of letting my tourist, Gaijin eyes wander through Jyukai.

Wednesday night is freezing. B.T. and I sit in an outside onsen (large bath filled with water piped in from a volcanically heated well), across from Fuji. We play cards in the lobby. No drinking, we're on a health kick, and quite exhausted, anyhow, from finding the trail and walking through the woods.

Thursday. B.T. and I bid each goodbye, with a plan to drink Hunter wine when he returns home in December. I head to Kyoto. Where I am now, and another story.

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