27 hours in the Japan Alps

November 3-4 I hiked through the southern Japan Alps to reach the top of Mount Baradani. Among the Japan Alps, Mt Baradani is the southern-most peak over 2000 meters. (It's the pointy mountain in the picture on the left.) A high school hiking club invited me to join them, 4 teachers, and one other ALT (Vanessa). We met Friday morning & drove up into the mountains a few hours from my apartment. The forested hillsides displayed beautiful fall foliage. The colors reminded me of Christmas lights--red, green, orange, and yellow.

The last hour of the drive was on a mountain road that had so many potholes I'm amazed we were able to keep driving. Our hike was a little longer because a recent rockslide closed a portion of the road near the trail head. But we were excited & anxious to start the adventure so we piled out of the vehicles & took off toward Mt. Baradani.

About 5 hours later we realized we'd passed the campsite, but we were too far past it (and too proud) to turn around, so we kept going forward. An hour later, because it was getting very dark very fast, we decided that any semi-flat area would work for us. The four students were in charge of everything--from cooking, to setting up camp, to cleaning up. They treated us as guests, laughing that they'd build us girls a castle in 90 seconds. They did it. A bright yellow tent castle. In 88 seconds.
After dinner we hung out, each wearing a headlamp and many layers of clothes, getting to know each other using a mixture of English and Japanese. We spent a chilly night in our tents, and I was slowly waking up after hearing the alarm ring at 4am. Then I heard an animal's cry like I'd never heard before. It was sad and strange and lonely sounding. Vanessa said, "What was that?!" I responded, "I'm not getting out of this tent!" Of course I did eventually, and learned it was a deer making the noise. We heard it again, but no one could tell me for sure why deer do that. It's really an eerie sound.

Before the sunrise, the stars were incredible! Minus the cold temperature, it was a beautiful morning. The boys made us a hot breakfast and we packed smaller backpacks for the journey to the summit. We left our bigger packs in the tents and took off for the top of Mt Baradani.

A few hours later we reached our destination! 2010 meters (6532 feet) above sea level. We did it! We took pictures, ate, and congratulated each other on a job well done. The view was gorgeous, and having worked so hard to get there made it even more beautiful and rewarding.

I've lost track of how many hours the return trip took. I tried to enjoy the scenery and remind myself what a cool adventure I was living. We visited an onsen (hot springs) afterwards--it was wonderful! My body felt exhausted for a couple days and I'm not sure how soon I'll take on another mountain, but I am very glad I climbed this one! :)