Planning on being there sometime in the next 2 weeks and just want to know about transport by bus there as well as the type of climb and duration for the average climber? Is it better to do it during the day or at night? Is camping along the mountain allowed? What about camping at the mountain base? Also is there a place I can store my backpack before climbing cuz climbing with it would really suck...
Reply to this Hi Danny,
I'm guessing you meant the title to be 'Mt. Fuji' so I changed it :-)
I climbed 'Fuji' overnight - up close in daylight it's a pretty plain mountain, but watching the sunrise from the top makes the overnight climb worth it.
There's a bus which leaves from Shinjuku Station and goes to the 5th station (half way up) where most climbers start from. I think we started climbing at about 10pm and were up there just before sunrise at 4:30am. This was without going hard out either. It does get crowded close to the top and you're forced to go slow, so allow for that if seeing the sun rise from the summit is your aim.
There are huts you can rest in, but I think they're pretty expensive for what you get, so unless its pouring down I wouldn't bother with them. Camping isn't officially permissable that I'm aware of, but I know some people that have camped along the way.
If you don't want to carry your large backpack (you'd be crazy to) you can probably leave it at your accomodation if you are staying there agin the next night. I just used a large coin locker at Shinjuku station.
You might see people climbing with plain wooden poles - you can buy these at the shop at the 5th station where the bus stops, and get stamps burned onto it at each station and at the summit - but you pay for each stamp. There's shops and a post box on the summit too (nice maybe to be able to send a postcard from there, but a pity about the commercialisation).
Reply to this Hi,
I climbed Mt. Fuji several years ago from Kawaguchiko. You can walk from the train station several miles along the flat before reaching a gate that marks the start of the climb at '1st station'. It's actually not as easy as you might think to find the start as almost noone walks from the bottom.
The first part of the climb is through forest, and I reckon you could camp there. Not sure if it's legal though. I left from Kawaguchiko train station at about 3pm and arrived at the '5th station' at a little before 10pm. In that time I saw one other walker coming down.
At '5th station' I joined some friends coming on the bus mentioned in the other post. I think you can dump your rucksack there - I have a vague memory that I did this as I had a heavy bag and can't imagine I took it any further up. From 5th station onwards you will be in a queue to the top. It can be very frustrating as people walk like zombies. The altitude makes it tough, and a lot of the people who attempt it aren't what you might call fit. Even so leaving 5th station by 11pm and you'll make it for sunrise at 4am.
Walking around the summit crater and admiring all the views takes about an hour. It's cold, so you may want to descend quicker.
Going down to 5th station via a different path is very fast. You can run as it's actually sandy for most of the descent.
Hope that's useful.
There's at least one excellent Onsen in Kawaguchiko which makes a magic end to the trip.
Reply to this I camped close to the top a couple of years ago. As Jo wrote, it isn't technically legal, but then again, nobody checks. Actually, you can camp perfectly at the top, which has a number of flat and grassy areas. Had I known that I would have definitely pushed on! Here is a link to my relevant blog:
Climbing and camping on the top of Japan (Mount Fuji, Japan) Reply to this 
