00:01 John Daub: Climbing Mount Fuji or simply driving towards Mount Fuji, watching Mount Fuji, wherever you are in Japan, whenever you come to visit, if you get a glimpse of Mount Fuji, it really is a special thing because it's just such a unique view on the horizon. It's hard to miss it. There aren't other big mountains around Fujisan (Mount Fuji). And over the last several years, this is a little video of me driving past it on the highway just a few days ago, beautiful view of it. Because of all the overtourism, because of the hiking path and so crowded and all of the other pollution and trash and the toilets and the cleaning of Mount Fuji, they've limited the number of tourists that can climb up to the top of Mount Fuji.

00:49 John Daub: The climbing season starts July 1st, a little bit into September. All of this is on the official website of Mount Fuji climbing. I have it right here on my computer. We're going to go over this in this episode. But according to the press release that just came out today, this is from Kyoto News. Online reservations to begin for climbing Mount Fuji. This just came out an hour ago. And you can see here the article laid out. I'll go over it with you.

01:22 John Daub: This is the Yoshida Trail (Yakō route), which is in Yamanashi Prefecture. Online reservations will be introduced for visitors climbing Mount Fuji on the most commonly used trails situated in Yamanashi Prefecture with the prefectural government set to start collecting entry fees this summer. This is nothing new. We knew this was coming. The new system, which will begin at 10 p.m. on May 20th, Japan time. I want you to mark that on your calendar because that's sort of a big deal. This is when the reservation system will start. It's aimed at easing congestion at reception by enabling climbers to pay ¥2,000 or about $13 in advance.

01:49 John Daub: As the prefecture accepts a maximum of 4,000 climbers per day, 3,000 slots will be available online. At least 1,000 visitors will be allowed to access by paying the fees at the trail's reception area on the day of the climb, according to the local government. Reservations can be made on the official website for climbing Mount Fuji, which is operated by the prefecture and other stakeholders until the day before the climb. With a minimum of ¥2,000. Up to 100 people allowed to book at once. That's a lot of people. Payments can be made by credit card or QR code and no refunds will be made in principle.

02:26 John Daub: They have a photo in the article of what it was like. It is quite congested. Not like Tokyo Disneyland, but it sure felt like it when I was climbing it. I'm going to share with you some of the photos of my last climb of Mount Fuji. But it certainly can get really congested. Mount Fuji is usually open to climbers from July to early September. The prefectural government said earlier this year, that it would start charging hikers ascending the 3,776-meter mountain from the Yoshida Trail to ease congestion and fund safety measures. I think this policy is going to be on all of the trails before long.

03:12 John Daub: Again, there's two prefectures, Shizuoka and Yamanashi, that are involved here. Designated as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Let me show you where Mount Fuji is so you get an idea. Because it is separated by, because it is on two prefectures, Mount Fuji is shared by the two prefectures. You can see most of it is on the Shizuoka side, but Yamanashi has one side of it as well. It is a serious climb, everybody. You can get altitude sickness, anything above 3,000 meters. I know I felt massive headaches every time I climbed up to the top.

04:01 John Daub: Not just the massive headaches, but one of the reasons why they're slowing things down. It's not just about the overtourism, which is something that you're going to hear more and more, this word overtourism, over the next six months to a year until Japan and the world figures out this problem. But they want to stop something that's called bullet climbing. And bullet climbing is where people will come in, they'll take a bus to the fifth station, which is like halfway up or so. And then you just climb all the way to the top, you catch the sunrise and you climb back down. This can create a lot of health problems. This can also be a risk, again, for altitude sickness. You're moving so quickly, you don't recognize the signs of it. You come back down and you get sick. Somebody always ends up in the hospital and they want to stop this.

04:48 John Daub: You have to respect the climb of the mountain. It is not an easy climb. Although people in their 90s have done it and kids as young as like five or six have done it, it's still a serious climb for the majority of people. I've seen girls climb it in high heels. Maybe they just, they're not going to make it to the top. I've seen people not dressed. I've seen tourists come here with T-shirts and shorts and no jacket. And there was no way to regulate. That's dangerous to do. First of all, climbing Mount Fuji with just a T-shirt and shorts and sneakers, you don't know until you get up there that when you're at elevation, even when it's like 100 degrees in Tokyo, it is freezing up on the top there with winds. So it's something that you really have to prepare for, I think.

05:38 John Daub: So let me show you my own experience. I have a Facebook page. I never use it. It's pretty much inactive. If you're messaging me on Facebook, just a note, don't expect a response. Unless it's the Only in Japan Facebook page, then I kind of scan that. But this is my old Facebook page from 2010. Yeah, bullet climbing, not the bullet train. I went with Anna Marchenko, and she's from Vladivostok. I met her here in Tokyo. She's now a celebrity in Taiwan, believe it or not. She left Tokyo about eight years ago. And she's become a TV star in Taiwan, which is really great. But I got a chance to work with her for this NHK show called Tokyo Eye.

06:44 John Daub: This is the bus that we went there from Shinjuku. You can see they have Mount Fuji food here. This is 14 years ago. We bought some air and a walking stick, which is a thousand yen, probably more now. We had one last dinner with the TV crew before we decided to climb it from the Fuji Yoshida side. You can see there's a lot of garbage at the entrance as well. But we made a lot of friends on our ascent, which was great. And as you go up, you go past stations. This was station number seven. I think there were ten stations, five stations going up to the top. 2,700 meters is, we still had a thousand meters to go.

07:26 John Daub: You can see there's places to eat and get food up there, rest stops. It's not a very exciting climb. And if you get a walking stick, you can see if you pay a little bit, they will burn in the stamp for each station or each rest stop that you stop at. Here's one of the mountain huts. Because there's no trees up there. It's just rocks. It almost looks like the surface of the moon, if you can imagine that. The food, the higher you get up Mount Fuji, the more expensive everything gets. A cup of noodles, which is like 100 yen back then, was 600 yen. You're going to pay it when you get that elevation anyways. Sake was 600 yen. You probably shouldn't be drinking alcohol at elevation. But you can get a beer and sake back 14 years ago. Or a can of oxygen, which you might need. That was 1500 yen. The oxygen helped mildly to get rid of the headache.

09:04 John Daub: But there's not a lot of oxygen in that can. It's basically nice to have for peace of mind. What is it, a lemon tea for 400 yen. It was just hot water and some lemon juice or something. But they have places where you can get some food up there. You can bring your own stuff, your own gas stove if you want. You can make your food up there. Bring a thermos. But whatever you carry up there, you gotta bring back down. Here I'm making some more friends. As you can see already, I'm dressed. When I'm climbing up there, you're pretty hot. But as the sun sets and it gets dark, it starts to get cold. And you're gonna be up there at 4 in the morning if you're looking at the sunrise, it is chilly. So be prepared for some cold. Sometimes, and with your head hurting. Again, make sure you bring a raincoat. It just, it rained once suddenly.

09:56 John Daub: It was sunny, sunny, sunny. Clouds came and it started to rain. And I'm glad that we had rain gear. Because everything got wet. But the poor cameraman, he was scrambling to get something on his camera there. But eventually we got the shoot done. We were sort of mild celebrities up there because we had a TV crew. And then in the studio, we came in to show the TV crew. And I said, look, you're tourists and people who are thinking of climbing. You do need to be prepared. That's what I wore 14 years ago. And if I were ever to go up there again, I would make sure I had rain pants and a rain jacket. And lots of layers. It was just a successful climb. I got paid a grand total of 100,000 yen to do it from Tokyo Eye. The most ever, I think, for any report that I ever did for NHK at the time.

10:51 John Daub: To make me go and climb Mount Fuji again, it would have to be a job. I can't imagine just climbing it for fun. It's not a fun climb. Unless you're with a bunch of friends or something. Mount Fuji is not a really fun climb. Number one, it's just... Today, especially after 2015... I did that in 2010. It wasn't really that crowded. Although it was crowded, but nothing like after 2015. When the tourism boom started. Japan went from like 6 million tourists to 20 million tourists. And a lot of those people who were coming in July, August, and September wanted to climb Mount Fuji. And that created the issue that we have today. It was just too dangerous. People were climbing too fast. It's not fun. It basically feels like you're in a Disneyland line. Or Universal Studios Japan. And the line just takes one step every couple of seconds. That's not hiking. It's like waiting in line to get to the summit.

12:01 John Daub: And when you get to the top... There was a vending machine up there. It was pretty expensive. But you gotta bring up whatever you... They gotta bring this stuff up. They had snowmobiles to bring the trash down. Special pads that could go down the mountain bringing trash and sewage. Because there were no sewage pipes. So anything that you did had to be in bags. We're talking like Chinese, Tibetan type of tourist infrastructure here. Bags of sewage being brought down by snowmobiles. And you had to be in the snowmobile very frequently. So there was cost. It's not easy to supply a tourism industry to climb Mount Fuji. And personally, I don't think it should be a tourist attraction. I think it's not a fun climb. There's so many other hiking climbs. But it is Mount Fuji. It's there. And you're gonna wanna climb it, right?

13:00 John Daub: This was me last week. When I was... Mount Fuji had just come out. It's all day and all of a sudden, boom! There you could see Mount Fuji. It's always like... Whenever you see it... I've been here for 26 years. It just makes you feel in awe of it. Because it's so big and so present. I've been to Mount Everest as well. I've been to Kilimanjaro also felt like that too. I've climbed Kilimanjaro. But Mount Everest is not that impressive. Because it's surrounded by so many other mountains. It doesn't look that intimidating. Mount Fuji does because you're going from the sea all the way to this volcano. It is crazy pretty to see. And even when I'm driving the car as you can see here. Like I gotta push the button on my camera and let it film Mount Fuji as we drive past it on the highway. It's such a beautiful sight in the background. Which is a reason why you might wanna live in this area too. Because you have that outside your window. Big Mount Fuji.

14:16 John Daub: Now people are gonna be making a reservation. We're gonna go over this website and some of the information on it. This is the first time I'm looking at it as well. If you make a reservation in advance that you can't change. There's high likelihood that it's going to rain. Because July 1st to about July 25th. It's kind of the rainy season. The best would be from like July 28th on. And then when you get into August. There's possibilities that there's a typhoon. So you're making a reservation now. March 20th is when it opens. For a date in July. During the typhoon season. There's a possibility that your plans are gonna be cancelled as well. So I want you to also consider that. If the typhoon comes. You're not gonna climb Mount Fuji. No one's gonna be climbing Mount Fuji. Unless it's people to rescue you at the top. But everybody can see the typhoon coming a mile away.

15:50 John Daub: This all opens up in just a week. Today is May 13th. Seven days from now. You're gonna be able to make that first reservation. I'm gonna bring my computer up. And we're gonna look at the screen together. So this is for the 2024 climbing season. Preparing your trip before climbing. This is how you know it's the real site. The risks. The itineraries. Access equipment. Etiquette. And the weather. These are all things you definitely should consider before climbing. The safe climbing checklist. They didn't do any of this before. Now they have live cameras of Mount Fuji. And guess what? Because it's raining. It's all looking pretty bleak.

17:36 John Daub: So they're opening the fifth station. The Yoshida Trail, which is the busiest of the Mount Fuji trails here. From the trail. The gate to the Yoshida entrance is going to be restricted from 4 p.m. They're not going to let anybody go up there because if you don't have a reservation. Unless you have a reservation for a place to stay and you've worked this out. The gate is closed to go up from 4 p.m. to 3 a.m. So after 3 a.m. You can go early in the morning, which is probably a good idea. The reason why is because they don't want you to bullet climb. If you're leaving at 3 a.m. or 5 a.m. That means you're probably going to be waiting there for the sunrise. So you're going to be on the mountain for quite a bit of time. You can acclimate.

18:45 John Daub: Meaning you can go up to 3,000 meters. Spend an hour. Go back down to 2,500 meters. Climb back up to 3,500 meters. Go back down. Climb up to 3,776. So then that helps you with making red blood cells. And avoiding altitude sickness. So the timing has a purpose there of closing the gate. I think that's really smart. They write about the donation fee. And the information. The optional donation. And the hiking fee. The donation is optional. But we greatly appreciate voluntary donations. I would probably add in another 1,000 yen. Just because I live here. I like what they're doing.

19:19 John Daub: What is the purpose of the donation? Operation of first aid situations. Operation of portable toilets. Operation of safety equipment and information center on the 6th station. Support for local disaster prevention. And prevention of invasive species. Maintenance expenses. That's what the hiking fee is for. Managing the local emergency contact point. Disaster response and discovery. Trail management and maintenance. So that's where the money's going. I like the fact that they're very transparent about where that money's going. Climbers who pass through the gate at the 5th station will pay 2,000 yen per person. So just by going through the gate, you have to pay 2,000 yen. It used to be 1,000 yen. And now the maximum fee charged per person will be 3,000 yen. I guess that's with the donation.

20:38 John Daub: They want to avoid potential accidents. And you know what? I want it to be more fun. And I think if there's less people up there, it's going to be way more fun. Where will the gates be installed? A gate will be installed at the entrance of the 5th station of the Yoshida Trail as shown on the left. So that's where the location of the gate. Anybody can go to the 5th station here. You can take a bus. I've done this before. I just go to the 5th station and you can get a feel of what climbing Mount Fuji is like. You don't have to climb Mount Fuji. You don't have to pay for a permit. There's some shops there. There's a parking area. If you want to drive your car there, do some shopping. You can eat lunch there. And then there's a gate. You can't go past that gate without paying and having a reservation.

22:05 John Daub: Many climbers ascending Mount Fuji want to witness the sunrise, meaning many will make the climb during the night, resulting in overcrowding and climbers descending the mountain without rest. Yeah, you definitely need to take it easy. Therefore, restrictions and passage have been put in place. The cause of altitude sickness and hypothermia were due to climbers ascending at night without taking a break. I hope they have somebody to check that you have the proper equipment. You can pay the hiking fee and the Mount Fuji conservation donation can be made using credit card cashless payments or QR code. However, we recommend carrying some cash on hand as the cash payments may be difficult during extreme weather. So that's a good reminder. If you're climbing Mount Fuji, bring some cash with you because you might have to pay for stuff in cash up there.

23:17 John Daub: Before climbing, I definitely think you need to have the equipment. You don't need to have like mountain climbing gear. You just need to have warm weather gear and hiking shoes. Trust me, good shoes go a long way. You're climbing uphill. It's a boring climb. It's sometimes sand and loose rocks. So you're going to want to be comfortable. Definitely bring rain gear. Bring a fleece sweater. Down jacket. Layers, essentially. Definitely gloves. Trust me, you're going to want to have neckwear, a hat for sure. The summit can be below zero Celsius even in mid-summer. This is true. I've been up there before. Headlamp. I would bring an LED headlamp for sure. One or two liters of water. You can get water at the mountain lodges. But whatever you take up, you have to bring out.

24:47 John Daub: Bring your own drinking water and buying at the mountain lodge. Definitely bring water. Definitely bring some snacks. Bring a plastic bag for your garbage as well. Easy to eat snacks. You're definitely going to need some energy up there. I would bring food because you don't know what they have up there. Sometimes they're sold out. Take your trash back home with you. This is a no-brainer. Cash, credit card cards, and a little bit of money. The toilets I believe were paid. I would bring some cash and some coins. Small bills. You just don't know. It's not like there's a bank up there. Trails are not a single road. Check out where you are on the map while walking. Understand that as you go up to elevation, the sun is stronger. You're going to want to have UV protection. Bring glasses for sure. It is a lot brighter up there. The weather changes really quickly.

26:26 John Daub: Bringing up some tape. Duct tape is always a good idea. If you get a hole in your shoe, or your shoe falls apart, having duct tape. I always travel with a small roll of duct tape. It comes in useful on trips like this. Hikers are advised to bring items for unexpected eruptions. Mount Fuji is a volcano. I'm glad they go through this because it's a volcano. You don't see Fuji-san as a volcano. You think of it as a mountain because it hasn't erupted since 1707 [?]. It says to bring a helmet. I'm not sure if the helmet is going to do too much for you. If you're on the side of an eruption, you're probably a goner. There's a helmet-free lending service at the 6th station. You have to pay a deposit of ¥2,000. If you borrow a helmet, you have to bring it back down.

27:58 John Daub: Dust masks can also fend off dust. It is tricky, especially when you go down. Trekkers around there, when you walk, it kicks up a lot of sand and fine dust into the air. So you might want to bring some masks. You don't want to breathe that crap in. Dust goggles can also do this. I think glasses might be enough. But if you're sensitive to that, then you definitely want to prepare. The website does a pretty good job, I think. It goes over stuff that maybe you didn't think about. Toilets. This is the biggest concern. I'm a picky person. I don't like to use public restrooms too often, even though Japan is clean. The toilets aren't that great. They're biological toilets. So that means they're breaking down naturally. There's no pipe going down to a processing unit area. So they might smell not the greatest.

29:07 John Daub: We ask that you make a donation. Please do bring some 100 yen coins and donate for it. We want to keep it around. If you're donating to it, it shows your appreciation. Pay attention to other people during the climb. Don't ring bear bells except when necessary. This is annoying. It's not just foreigners. Japanese bring these bear bells. I don't think there's going to be a bear up there because there aren't any trees up there from a certain point. So put your bear bells away because it's annoying to hear the jingling. After five minutes of it, your patience starts to wane a little bit. When you climb with many people, pay attention to the people outside your group and your surroundings. It's not always good to be so loud and talking all the time. Save your energy. Pack items tightly so the equipment and plastic bottles do not fall off.

30:17 John Daub: When using a ladder and walking up rocky paths, store the walking poles in your backpack. Having a walking pole is a good idea. It'll help your knees going down. I remember I gave my walking pole to the director who had bad knees and that helped him. But I wish maybe I had brought two. They're pretty cheap. You can buy these bamboo walking poles. It makes it a good souvenir. I think I still have mine up here. Yeah, here it is. 14 years ago. This is my pole from 2010. And I think it cost me an extra $30 or something to get all these burned-in stamps. But it's pretty cool. But I'm gonna be honest with you. This stick has no value. You can't chop this in half and take it with you in your suitcase. It's hard to travel with this darn thing. It's about 4 feet long. Once you buy this stick, there's a good chance you're just gonna toss it. You have to have a plan for it.

33:17 John Daub: I've climbed from three of the routes. I climbed up one, down another. The Gotemba, I climbed down. I climbed up the Fujinomiya. And then we did Fujiyoshida for NHK. You can climb in the off-season, but you need permits and stuff. And it can be dangerous. You should be, at that time, a serious hiker. Can you take your dog with me? It is legally prohibited to release animals outside. Please do not climb with your pet, nor go into the mountain huts, rest stops. I have a six-year-old child. Can I take him with me? These are good questions! What is your physical strength experience in mountains? It would be pretty hard for a six-year-old. I'd say around eight or nine. But anything less than that, you're probably going to have to carry them a little of the way.

34:41 John Daub: Are buses running, even at night, climbing buses and shuttles? There are shuttle buses. It's very well set up now. How far apart are the toilets? Again, you can't just pee on a rock. Now there are people around. You can't just pee everywhere, okay? We're not dogs. People are walking around here. So you must use designated toilets. The public restrooms at the 7th station are extremely crowded depending on the day. If you've got to go, you better go. But you sweat out a lot of this. So you probably don't have to go to the bathroom that much. Portable stoves. There's no legal restriction. However, there's a risk of fire. Please be careful when using portable stoves. Pitching tent is prohibited by law. You really have to do your research. The policies have changed so much over the last 10 years. It's a different experience than when I last climbed it.

36:29 John Daub: It's not a fun hike. It's a lot of planning for something. You're going to have a headache the next day. You ruin a day. You're probably going to be worn out. Unless you really want to do it, just not doing it. If you like hiking, this is a bad hike. Let me put it to you like that. If you're doing it because you like hiking, don't do it. It's not a good hike. Sometimes climbing up the mountain near Fuji... Climbing up the mountains around it, there aren't that many. But Mount Fuji is kind of special. But if you go out to other mountains in Shizuoka Prefecture, it can be quite nice. And you get nice views of Mount Fuji. Depending. Sometimes you just you can get above the clouds and get Mount Fuji above the clouds when it's all cloudy down at sea level. So there's advantages to climbing other peaks.

37:41 John Daub: I think Japan is one of the best hiking countries in the world. It shows with the amount of hiking equipment that they have. Montbell. They have tons and tons of stores for hiking here in Tokyo. You can get your hiking equipment here. You don't need to buy it, bring it from home. You can get stuff here and probably it pays off with the exchange rate. But if you're coming here just for Mount Fuji, then there's so many better hikes. Something that you should definitely consider. Again, I don't think it's worth it. Because look, you have to reserve this in advance now. You don't know if it's going to rain. Like before, when you didn't need a reservation, you'd look out and say, oh, the weather is going to be crap. I'm not going to go today. Let's do this next week. You could do that. Now you can't because you're locked in.

38:35 John Daub: And you can't pick another day because you've reserved this day. So there's a high likelihood that your day is going to be cancelled. So I wouldn't plan your vacation around climbing Mount Fuji. In fact, make sure you've got a Plan B. But it's interesting that they do have set this up really well. And if you are thinking of climbing Mount Fuji, go ahead and do it. And send me some pictures. Share it on our Discord server because we'd like to hear about your experience. But will I ever climb Mount Fuji again? Probably once more. I might wait until Leo is older. But if the mood strikes me, I don't know what I'll do. I might do it for the channel. Other YouTubers have done it. I've got nothing really to add except for how it's changed. The experience of what it was like when I first climbed in 1998 and then 2010 compared to 2024.

39:40 John Daub: Climb Mount Fuji. The old proverb about climbing Mount Fuji twice. Climb it once, shame on you. Climb it twice, shame on me. Something like that. I got paid the second time. The third time probably again. You want to climb Mount Fuji, Kanae Daub? She says no. She doesn't want to climb it. She doesn't like high places. And you can see it from an airplane. In fact, from the airplane, it's really nice. So you get views of Mount Fuji all the time. Just check if you're flying down to Yonago, you go right over it, I think. But if you're flying to Miyazaki or even to Osaka, you're probably going to see it off of the right side of the plane, but sometimes on the left side of the plane. I think if you Google it, JAL, which side of the plane is Mount Fuji, there's actually a website that will tell you.

41:19 John Daub: I'll take some questions before we end this livestream. It's been 40 minutes of Fuji-san talk. Aloha from Michael Sassano. I visited Mount Fuji, but not for hiking. Not much of a hiker myself, but was able to at least visit there for the special Mount Fuji melon pan. Yes! The food around Mount Fuji, like you have the curry rice shaped mountain Fuji, that's always fun to eat. Sometimes they put the curry around the outside of it, like a lake, you know? Lake looks like sewage, but it's good! It's fun, the different kinds of food. The melon pan is also good, the confections. Do you know Peter von Gomm from NHK back then? I actually met Peter von Gomm on this job. That's the first photo that I had with Peter von Gomm when we decided to go get a beer. He still had hair. He was on this shoot at the studio. He was a narrator for this episode.

43:05 John Daub: What's the current average of Mount Fuji climbers? 3,000 per day? Well, this year it's going to be 4,000 per day from the Fuji Yoshida Trail. But I don't know if that means other trails will have more people. So I think it's something like 10,000 to 12,000 people a day maybe. The Gotemba Trail was the least populated trail because it's the hardest and the longest. It's a really rocky trail. It's hard to climb up that. But going down was pretty interesting. When I came down the Fuji Gotemba Trail in 1998, there was nobody else around us. I went with another English teacher named Katie. She was the teacher at Toyohashi and I was working at Okazaki. And we got back. There was not a soul coming up or down the Gotemba Trail in July of 1998. And when we got to the bottom, the parking lot was empty. There was this one guy. He was from Nepal. And we hitched a ride from him into Gotemba Station. He was really nice to take us.

44:46 John Daub: Is the rainy season hot? That's a good question. I think May is hotter than June. The rainy season typically will start around June 10th and go on to about July 20th. Last year's rainy season was really short. I've had rainy seasons that started at the end of May and rainy seasons that went on to the end of July. By August 1st, rain is done. Usually. But it's usually cooler when it rains. The monsoons, the rain brings in more wind. And because you're wet all the time, you feel colder. And the wind brings in fresh air. So I always thought like Golden Week, May 1st to May 20th is usually warmer than June 1st to June 20th in that sense. But when the sun is out, it's much, much hotter. The humidity starts to come in around June. Right now, it's so perfect outside despite it's raining today. It's the perfect weather. May is the perfect month for visiting Japan or for hiking for that matter.

46:06 John Daub: What other mountains did you climb? There's so many of them. I climbed a lot when I was in Fukushima and I lived there. When I lived in Toyohashi and in Okazaki, I'd go with this other English teacher on the Iida line and we would go up into the mountains and then we would spend the weekends just climbing. I've done a lot of hikes in Yamanashi and Nagano as well. There's a hundred peaks and a lot of the climbers will try to climb all 100 peaks that are famous in Japan. How much time does it take if someone wanted to hike up slowly? Usually, I don't think it would take any more, it shouldn't take more than 24 hours. So if you start at 3am you should be finished by midnight at least. I can't imagine it taking more than 24 hours. You're starting at like 1200m or something like this. You're starting pretty high anyways. It's that last 1200m, 1300m that are pretty challenging and that are the hike.

47:34 John Daub: If you want to climb it slowly, I don't think you could climb it slowly and take that long unless you really stopped and acclimated. I think like 12 hours would be the slowest. If you want to do it for just like 3 or 4 hours, you can do it really fast coming down. Going up is hard. But when you come down, you're exhausted. I've always had a headache and I think it might be from dehydration. But the next day, for the next few days you feel really good because you have all these red blood cells in your system and you feel really energetic and you feel good. So it's positive. But man, it's not a great hike. Easiest among the 100 peaks in Japan is Ibukiyama. I've heard of that one. It could very well be.

48:56 John Daub: Any other questions? I'll take one more before we end. It's always interesting to hear back. And you can continue this on either in the comments if you're watching in playback or go to the Discord server. There's people that are right now thinking of climbing Mount Fuji. Maybe you can find a friend to climb it with you. Would you have a better time going to the Sapporo Snow Festival? Yes. That's without question. I can't think of like having a good time climbing Mount Fuji. My answer to having a good time, it's like 0%. What I remember from Mount Fuji was I like to meet the other people. But you can do that anywhere. The coolest thing that gets old really quickly is when the sun goes down and the moon comes out and you look around it looks like the surface of the moon. Like you're in space. Because there's no trees up there. There's no vegetation up there. There's a little bit of snow and it's in July.

50:23 John Daub: It's crowded. If you've got to use the toilet you're going to hate it. If you have to wait in line for the toilet, you're not going to like it. If you're someone who has to use the toilet a lot don't do it. Wear a diaper. Come with a diaper that you can carry back down maybe. That's not a bad idea actually. One last thing. Don't go drinking the night before you climb Mount Fuji. Try to get a good rest. Be in good physical health. Don't be hungover. I remember meeting people that were drinking at Roppongi the night before they got up there and they did not look like they were having a good time. They were dehydrated and they were physically in bad shape at the summit. Those people were suffering and they were in better shape than me. You know wearing tank tops and oh look at me I got a muscle. Those muscles really didn't help you so much did you sirs? You've got to show them respect. They're bigger than you. But yeah. You want my jacket now Mr. Tank Top don't you? Muscles don't keep you so warm. You should have brought your down jacket. Buddy boy.

52:16 John Daub: If you have questions leave them in the comments below I'm happy to answer them with my experiences of climbing Mount Fuji over the last two times. But mark your calendar down for next week May 20th. I've got a feeling that a lot of these dates are going to go pretty quickly. My recommendation would be to climb Mount Fuji sometime between August 1st and August 30th. When there's less chance of having like the monsoon rains. But keep in mind typhoons come all the time. You can't predict the rain up there. You can't predict anything on Mount Fuji. Including when it when and if it erupts. If that's not enough to tell you that maybe you shouldn't be doing this. They're warning you that Mount Fuji could erupt. So keep that in mind. Won't you? Alright guys thanks so much. I'll see you in another live stream tomorrow. Matane.

53:16 John Daub: Can you climb when it's not climbing season? Jonathan go back to the website or you can pan back about 20 minutes ago. But the answer is not really. The climbing season stops somewhere around September 10th. But you need specialized gear and a guide and a permit. And it gets more expensive and more difficult and more dangerous. Keep in mind that it's dangerous even during the climbing season because it's 3776 meters high. When I climbed Kilimanjaro it took me five and a half days and that was fast. Because it was 5700 meters high. It's significantly higher. Not double but I definitely was feeling it. And we were doing acclimation when I climbed Kilimanjaro. Mount Fuji it's high enough where you should do some acclimation. A little bit. You can go up, spend two hours at 3200 meters come down to 2500 go back up to the summit. Maybe that's a good idea.

54:23 John Daub: I'm not an expert climber. Kilimanjaro is not a hard climb. It's just a long one. Kilimanjaro is great. I did it because Michael Crichton did it and he wrote about it when I was a high school kid. I read his book Climbing Mount Kilimanjaro so I wanted to do it too. It was a good climb. We found a guide when we got to Tanzania. A local guide. No toilets up there. Usually there's one public one but it's a disgrace. It was really bad. It was a good challenge. I'm glad I climbed Kilimanjaro when I did. That was 2001. When I got back down to the bottom that's when September 11th happened and the attack in New York City happened. I remember that very plainly being in Nairobi the day after and hearing in Swahili the radio reports when I was in the supermarket of them saying New York and attack.

55:25 John Daub: We went into the internet cafe and saw the CNN America under attack stuff. That was quite a big... I rest in peace Michael Crichton that was a big part of the memory of climbing Kilimanjaro the days afterwards where we had to get out of Kenya because the State Department told us not to be there because of the risk of those that attacked were involved. We're also highly active in Kenya so we had to leave Kenya. The customs officer in Nairobi saw that I was American and said that he was praying for me and my country. I got down to South Africa I couldn't get a flight back up to Paris which is where we were coming through it was a really crazy day so we had to stay in Paris at a safari lodge. I did not complain. It was a little expensive but what could you do until flights were... this is worldwide. Flights are grounded.

56:19 John Daub: We got on a flight back to Paris and it took me a month before I could get back to the US. One of them was one of the responders. He was a doctor and he was helping people in particular NYPD and NY Fire Department recover from the rescue efforts afterwards which was something that still goes on to this day thanks to the first responders. My gosh they're brave. But yeah I lived through that and part of the climbing experience so you never know. Mount Fuji could even be a little bit of a big deal and that could be a time where you don't want to be up it and we'll be watching you on the news. Thanks everybody. I'll see you. Matane.