hyakumeizan – Susan Spann, Adventure, Mystery, and Mountains

New Year’s Eve on Mt. Tsukuba (筑波山) (2021)

Susan Spann 1000 Summits, Blog, Hikes January 1, 2022January 1, 2022hiking, hiking in Japan, hyakumeizan, Ibaraki, Mt. Tsukuba, Tsukubasan

In December 2018, I established a new, personal New Year’s Eve tradition: I climb a mountain. In Japan (as elsewhere) New Year’s Eve is a time for personal reflection, and I reflect on myself, my year, and the world around me better on a mountain trail than just about anywhere else. The New Year’s Eve climb is also my way of expressing my hope that I’ll keep moving forward (and upward) and keep returning to the mountains in the coming year. This year, I chose to go back to the proverbial “scene of the crime”–the site of my original, 2018

Hiking Mt. Yotei

Susan Spann 1000 Summits, Hikes August 30, 2021December 3, 2021hikes in Japan, hiking, hiking in Japan, Hokkaido, hyakumeizan, Japanese mountains, Mt. Yotei, Yotei, Yoteizan

Mt. Yotei, also known as Ezo-Fuji for its resemblance to Japan’s most famous peak, is a stratovolcano located in Hokkaido’s Shikotsu-Koya National Park.

CHAPTER 29: Lake Akan & Meakan

Susan Spann 1000 Summits, Blog, CLIMB Photo Companion May 5, 2021May 5, 2021Hokkaido, Hokkaido Nature Tours, hyakumeizan, Lake Akan, Meakan, Mt. Meakan, Nihon Hyakumeizan

Although I originally planned for Hokkaido Nature Tours to provide me with only transport and guides for the climbs of Hokkaido’s hyakumeizan peaks, the company’s founder, Ido Gabay, constructed my itinerary in a way that not only maximized my chances of success (an important consideration, given my aggressive timeframe) but transformed the necessary “rest and travel days” into opportunities to experience much more of Hokkaido than I dared to hope for.

CHAPTER 28: Takuto & Tomuraushi

Susan Spann 1000 Summits, Blog, CLIMB Photo Companion April 21, 2021May 5, 2021100 Summits, hiking in Japan, Hokkaido, Hokkaido Hiking, Hokkaido Nature Tours, hyakumeizan, Nihon Hyakumeizan, Tomuraushi

September 13-14, 2018 This photo supplement tracks the events in CLIMB: Leaving Safe and Finding Strength on 100 Summits in Japan. The captions offer “extra features” that didn’t make it into the book. Due to straining my knee on Tokachidake, I ended up canceling the next day’s scheduled climb of Poroshiri–which meant I absolutely would not be able to complete all 100 Hyakumeizan peaks in a single year. I’d already decided to shift the goalpost, however, and climb 100 historically and culturally important/sacred mountains instead, so the loss meant less to me than it otherwise would have. After a rest day, which

CHAPTER 27: Tokachidake

Susan Spann 1000 Summits, Blog, CLIMB Photo Companion April 18, 2021April 21, 2021hiking, hiking in Japan, Hokkaido, Hokkaido Nature Tours, hyakumeizan, Japan, Mt. Tokachi, Nihon Hyakumeizan, Tokachidake

September 11, 2018 This photo supplement tracks the events in CLIMB: Leaving Safe and Finding Strength on 100 Summits in Japan. The captions offer “extra features” that didn’t make it into the book. On the morning of September 11, my Hokkaido Nature Tours guide (who I’d christened the Yamabushi) and I drove approximately 200 kilometers from Sapporo to Daisetsuzan National Park in Central Hokkaido–home to some of the tallest mountains in Hokkaido, including our target for the day: 2,077-meter Tokachidake (Mt. Tokachi). What look like “normal” cumulus clouds in the photo above are actually clouds of smoke and steam rising from the

CHAPTER 22: Summit Dawn

Susan Spann 1000 Summits, Blog, CLIMB Photo Companion January 27, 2021February 7, 2021Climb, Climbing mountains, Fujisan, hiking in Japan, hyakumeizan, Japan, Mount Fuji, mountains, Mt. Fuji

While it’s possible to climb up and back from the summit of Mt. Fuji in a day (and given the altitude of the Fujinomiya trailhead, I actually made several longer one-day round-trip hikes during the 100 Summits year), we opted for the more typical “overnight hike” in order to try and catch the sunrise from Fuji’s summit.

CHAPTER 21: Mount Fuji

Susan Spann 1000 Summits, Blog, CLIMB Photo Companion January 16, 2021January 27, 2021100 Summits, Climb, Climb photo companion, Fuji, hiking, hyakumeizan, Japan, Mt. Fuji

After years of waiting (and more than two dozen attempted viewings spoiled by clouds) this was my first full view of Mt. Fuji, from the window of my hotel in Fujinomiya, the morning we began the climb.

CHAPTER 16: Daisen’s Giant Chipmunk

Susan Spann 1000 Summits, Blog, CLIMB Photo Companion December 4, 2020December 14, 2020Climb, Daisenji, hiking, hyakumeizan, Japan, Mt. Daisen, photography, Sanraku-so, shukubo

Mt. Daisen: July 1, 2018 This photo supplement tracks the events in CLIMB: Leaving Safe and Finding Strength on 100 Summits in Japan. The captions offer “extra features” that didn’t make it into the book. At the time of its completion in 2011, the Tokyo Skytree was the largest tower, and the second-largest man-made structure in the world. As of 2020, it remains in the top five, and is easily visible from many of Tokyo’s 23 wards, as well as the neighboring mountains. At night, and on holidays, the tower lights up in a variety of colors. I loved being able to

CHAPTER 15: Magic in the Mundane

Susan Spann 1000 Summits, Blog, CLIMB Photo Companion November 30, 2020December 4, 2020100 Summits, butterflies, Climb, hiking, hiking in Japan, hyakumeizan, Japan, ski lift

As the end of June, and my first apartment move in Japan, approached, I made a two-day trip to Nagano Prefecture to climb Kirigamine (aka Kurumayama). The trip did not go as planned, in many ways–and yet this ended up among the most memorable climbs of my mountain year.

CHAPTER 14: Too Many Bees

Susan Spann 1000 Summits, Blog, CLIMB Photo Companion October 3, 2020October 3, 2020100 Summits, Climb, hyakumeizan, Japan, jimmu, mountains, Mt. Odaigahara, Odaigahara, yatagarasu

Odaigahara lies in southern Nara Prefecture–several hours south of Nara City (itself, an hour south of Kyoto)–in a mountainous region formerly known as Yamato. After two days of rain, I was glad to see the sun as the bus set out for the trailhead.

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