New Britain Herald Newspaper, June 24, 1921, Page 16

’ \/ A l‘ Al o] » A/ 1‘ ’ NTERESTINGLY OF NIPPON’S ISLE AND OF TRIP TO FAMOUS MOUNTAIN OF FU. | e following letter has been re- ed by the secretary of Centennial In this city from Charles B. op, a former local man, who is eling In Japan The letter is y descriptive and of interesg to iple of this city The letter fol- s Falrmount Hotel, No. 16 Bluff, Yokohama, Japan, April 2nd, 192 tennial Lodge, No. 118, New Britain, Conn. your 1920, dues, esteemed with for am in receipt of r of December 17th, josed receipt for my ch I think you. has been my intention for some past to tell you about a trip I last summer to the top of yama, the sacred mountain, and nd its base, and this is the first prtunity 1 have had to begin it. Description of Fujiyama. Jlyama means Fuji Mountain. | it is called Mount ujl, and| San. The “San” is an honorary of address, as Mr. Fuji. For in- ice, 1 am called Bishop San by the nese, which means Mr. Bishop. jiyama is an extinct volcano; last eruption occurred in 1707; it ply a huge cinder pile 7 high: it is a true truncated cone & out of a plain, the sides sloping In angle of about forty-five de- , but is steeper near the top, e the lava crops out of the nic ashes and cinders. There ve starting points for the a nt, ome of them, if not all of them, @ Into one trail as the top is hed. off | that | are cani muc tart of Trip. rting from Subashiri-Guehi are eight rest houses, or sta- . on the way to the top, the dis- between them decreasing as the s approached The first one or re Japanese houses with wooden es around them for the ravleers, but near the top erely huts, bullt against of the mountain huts are heavily ks of lava keep use they | the | ho weighted to the wind At horses tation, which of | saddle horses mor menace after one or two p t | balance of the stock coolie who is the pairs of good Japanese sho: trails on each ands of these The automobile to Subashiri many h country trees. Sup no one can ride The roofs of | kicking, with | ljons | useless as they roll up in a ball under the hollow of one’'s foot or they slip | at the heel and become a real The result is irs of them useless the to the dozen The re lined of thous- to one's life. found is given richer by a ried and Fuji, by the way, side by hundred straw sanda road from Gotemba s a rough road over vol- cinders. There are through which run water courses, and the is covered with pine up wes and valleys deeper around Obtains Horses. shiri obtained to take to the eighth which i highest point at v ho go. As they are mares are used as usual Japanese lot of ugly, biting, fighting stal- which are have us up the can only the which a a sque As it docile ling, and is, the mares, than the stallions, ravelers, but near the top they|to have a groom or coolie to 1 being water tight huts are not very comfortable mericans, but they the ese very well. However, foreign lers make the best of it when id to use them, but it is a case blowing them off, and they ry glad indeed to reach one of The elghth station is very the top, and between this|a n and the top there is a shrine Is used as a rest house by It is customary to make a lon to the shrines, so great | of the travelers omit this rest- aoe. re is a saying to the effect wise man that climbs to Fujl once, but he is a fool who to climb up there twice, so 1 fool as 1 have been up Mount| wice. I might add that the bart Increases as the square of umber of times that a person to the top of Fuji I know an who has climbed to the top| mes and he never had & clear day on any of his trips. Started in August. first ascent was in late August. nd my wife and daughter and only able to reach the station, which the Japanese Hachi-Ban,” which means the house We left Yokohama d station at 9:15 a. m. and we B there at 10:30 p. m. the same | 50 It is fifty-two miles from the|get ama station to Gotemba-Guchi, we leave the train. Here short rest while waiting for an | pbile to take us to Subashiri- & town about eight miles dis 'om Gotemba, also we each sed a kongo-zue, or wooden o ald us in our ascent up the in These staffs are four feet nches long, and they are - in shape except for about inches where the hand grasps hich place they are round h station on the way up it ary to have the name and| Jr of the station branded on the 2ue, the charge for which is or five cents. At all the from one eight inclusive or is of burnt wood or black, the top it is red, which is the| hat the top was actually| jl. Of course, on this trip we 0 get the red mark or label o also induced to buy straw to tle on the soles of our| hich we were Informed were savers they would ar from My oth | we atin serve it and a for that | the pleas- the w were we M is to top. | begs which horses to neg merely has keep groom rwise > carry |to carry one's food supplies next to impossit est food; foreigner can eat | of relish—if one happens to be good | plenty |enough to get the right kind. o three horses, guide. In mounted |of Mount Fuji n rrow sta ffs br we proceeded on our way As soon as H timber wk 1y of the thing merely left the management of the the finding trail, follow. inches formed on the down-the-mountain side, no st many wall eide, low retaining wall on each trail tween twenty-four or The train is about ankle deep in soft, volcanic ashes, and it zig-zags up the|traversed the night and in some places their the as a “goriki,” ally a it good be was a coolie woman. or moun- coolie, to is necessary along as on by known them wa » hired a uide, but our baggs as though there are some kinds with a fair degree fortunate Thus had one hungry, and & of thr grooms, we little party three ur and Description of Mountain. hour were way the top long time the we to about one our For and on |trail was through a forest of pines | interspersed | trees, our beechwood trees. ent was quite gradual, but soon it hardwood resembled first the *ome which At with the bark of in places, for trail and the our ep hard scramble tiate, as the very crooked rocky gully. Arrived at fon, or ichi-ban, had nded, and, after a short to be made auite it a we re ibove the tall the clouds, saddle to below us, we were were above in the country line we turned the hen we view of we looked down upon a billowy mass of snow-white vestige of the country below us could clouds, and not a we see. became little horse, behind horse trail to me quite aware some- lady-groom soon fact that I about riding trudged along knew a s0 nd of the however, was In fact, it about wide, and in some places it is by a lava-stone retaining wall but it man edg easy is thirty to coing th on prevent the is a low up-the-mountain there parapet fror plac built over In the s a of the true be- and the are about high side particularly the eighth station These low walls thirty inches which is or | the to eat Japan-| retaining | three | Feach | Moonlight Night Fortunately for us, it was moonlight night, otherwise have been dark at 7 p. m., follow the trail without much diffi- |culty. As I had a good horse, I easily kept the lead, and frequently I would have to stop at some good turn in the trail and wait for the others to come up with me, when I would start on again unless the other |horses wanted to rest, which of cou was frequently the case, especially as we approached the top. This method of ascending kept my horse quite fresh, which, later on, reacted upon me with much greater force than otherwise would have been It happened in this way. negotiating the last sixth station, 1 ob- more steep than so I leaned forward in the and urged my horse up this steep incline, which she took at her utmost speed. Just as I was about at the top of this incline T dimly saw something across the path ahead of me, so I quickly ducked my head still lower, but not quick enough or low enough, and the top of my head struck this object at such an angle that it did not knock me off of my horse. Fortunately, I had on a thick felt hat which saved my scalp from being cut, and the natural thickness of my head saved me from a fractured skull. My hat was knocked off, and it took twenty minutes at least to find it. Diffcrent Stations. a nice it would so I could case. as 1 up the that it Just w served was usual, saddle Investigation disclosed the fact that there is a shrine at the sixth station, and at the approach, or path, to every shrine there i5 a torii, or prayer gate, nd this is what I bumped into. A torii is constructed of two columns, one on each side of the approach to a| connecting beam at the This beam is columns near shrine, and a top of the column. mortised through the the top and be them curving slizhtly landing at the row, there was no room for an ap- proach the shrine at right angle to the trail, so they set up their torii right across the trail. As I said in the foregoing, reached the eighth station at p. m., s soon the (hachi-ban-ya) of the hut could ad a couple of futons on the floor for us to lie on and give us two apiece to put over we im- retired for the balance of the night We did not remove our hats, coats or shoes, neither did we unloosen a button or untie a string, but we just dropped onto those | futons and pulled the other two over as it was about zero weather at altitude (12,000 feet), and . . . When we arose the next the wind was blowing with such terrific violence that had to abandon the trip to the top. notwith- standing our proximity to it had reached the top the pre- day and were now descending were blown flat onto ound by the violence of the About 10 a. m *an our foot, as we the night had on first 1kerchief the flying cinders the skin, yet they would the handkerchief with be painful I had an excellent route had before, it the upw sixth projecting rd. As station vond the nar- to we na as spr more mediately that morning we who cedir the the mountain had before wind descent on our horses ch of us and tied a to pr cutting ° over face Ve from \pinge uch In opportunity force as to quite descent to our see the we and projects a short distance | ends | 10:30 keeper | Men ! | Herewith are reproduced five pie- | |tures taken by Mr. Bishop on his |trip and concerning which there is |a detailed account in the accompany- ing article. The upper left picture shows the party ready to start on the trip, the queer little cars also being shown. The upper middle picture is a Japanese wayside temple and the |upper right shows Mr. Bishop and |nis fellow tourists: The lower pic- tures are taken from the boat as It neared the famous mountain. and from there we rode to Subashiri, where the automobile was waiting to take us to Gotemba. Ar- | rived home, we did not get over that | trip for two full weeks, we were so sore and chafed from the unusual ride in the saddle. Last Summer’s Trip. Now for the trip we made last summer. There were three couples in the party. Mr. A, who is the rep- resentative of the U. S. Steel Corp., and his wife; Mr. and Mrs. B. (Bishop); and Mr. C, who is the rep- resentative of the Crucible Steel Co. of America, and his wife. We planned a six days trip, and we had to take food enough to last us for the journey; and as we had to travel in a first class train and we expected to| stop at one or two good hotels, we' took some good dressy clothes with' | us besides our mountain and tramp-| ing clothes. For food, we took three fried chickens, six loaves of bread, a can of butter, a can ol coffeé, sugar and pices, six pounds of sweet chocolate, and various other good things to eat. and I put in two pounds of excellent prunes, very much to Mrs. B.'s dis- gust and protestations. To her sur- prise, however, the prunes were very popular, and to her still greater | surprise Mr. and Mrs. A. brought like quantity. The pruncs uncooked, and they a real | confection when eaten just as | they are boxed for shipment. Our supply of food was typical of what | the others brought with them. | We left Yokohama at 9.75 a. m. on | July 31st, 1920, and arrsed in Go- | temba on schedule time. While A. and C. were getting the baggage out with the aid of Red-Caps, I rushed |ahead and secured two automobiles to take us and the baggage to Su- bashiri. We had lunch (here it is called tiffin) at a Japanese place where they served foreign food, such; as it is, which we ate with a-good deal of merriment. As soon as Mr. A. and C. had purchased four kongo- zue for themselves and wives (we had our 1918 staffs with us), we boarded the automobiles and started for Subashiri. At Subashiri we put up night at the Yoneama hotel, a Japanese place, so we could get an early start the next morning for the top of Mount Fuji. Before retiring for the night we made arrangements for six saddle horses, six grooms, and three goriki, or mountain guides, to rry our bagzage to the top of Fuji and thence to Yoshida. After leav- | ing instructions to be called ‘“early! Mother dear,” we reclined on our futons and went to sleep—the ladies in one room and the gentlemen in another room. Hotel The Yonevama hotel is a two story buildinz with one portion of it ex- tending back at right anzles to the front portion or the street. It was ir this part on the second floor where we had adjoining rooms, which are reached by a narrow balcony running each side of the building. Now panese hotel is always a ver; place at night, and this one was no exception to the rule. It 1 Japanese law that all houses must | be closed up tight at night, and for this purpose all drcrway: .. p: vided with sliding rtitions, > when put place, make a Japanese hease look like barn witho “incows in it. About twelve o'clock 1 heard Mr. C. taliing loudly to sowm»- tocy and at the sane tice [ heard N A. Chokir v.ith s uothe liushter, and th iattle aad clatter of the thin woode1 ovtside shutters h were being put un for the Several times T heard Mr. o to somehbodv to make less . kut on the vhole I had a good sleep ani rest | Party Cali-a ' Tte next mor:in: I up, and the outside shutter | had been taken down at daybre and vred away for the day I was stepping on: on_the horses a were | zood are | for the Accommodations. along a J noisy w in 2d arly., was the ftirst k Just baico ity after the manner of all Japanese, he informed them that it was time to get up. Us men folks hustled down stairs to » ave, but we oiuitted our usual 1235 :ng bath as ac were in a hurry to be on our journey. After break- fast we went to the front to prepare £.r the journey, and then began the usual row with the coolies, which was settled by our hiring two more of tiem to carry our baggage, as a goriki will not carry any more than thirty pounds, so we now had six horses, six grooms, and five goriki, which made quite an imposing cavalcade as we passed through the main street of Shubashiri. As we have to provide the men with food on theso trips besides their reg- ular pay, it ia adways the part of wis- dom to keep the number of men down to a minimum. Then, too, they ex- pect to be treated at every station on the way up or down, and these fel- lows have a prodigious appetite when they are feeding at somebody else's expense. However, it is a part of the game, and we cheerfully do it. Mor tations. ‘When we arrived at the first station (ichi-ban) we dismounted and had our sticks stamped with a branding iron, had something to eat and drink, and then we remounted, but before proceeding on our journey Mr. C. took our pictures. I am enclosing ona o! them, and on the margin thereof I have lettered each individual so you can sec how we looked at this stage of the game. It is not necessary for me to mark them Mr. B. or Mrs. C. as you can supply the title of address. As we were about to leave the sixth station, the grooms announced their intention of jumping their contract on the plea that they could not go any farther, but we refused to pay them their money. They then said that one of the horses had cast a shoe and was made lame and for that reason they would have to return to Subashiri. We said: *““All right, but wa will de- duct two yen from each man’a wages.” Three of the men had said so much that now they could only accept our terms, so they were paid and the other three continued with us: the ladies riding and wua men walking, Picture No. 2 shows tha three ladies on their mounts and the lava formation between the sixth and seventh stations. Contract Jumping. I tell you about these little trou- bles as it is characteristic of a Jap- anese to jump a contract without any apparent reason for it, and it is a very difficult matter to hold them to it. At the seventh station w: dismissed the other three horses, ai the dis- tance between the seventh and eighth stations is short but quite steep and the hors eldom negotiate this part of the trail. From now on the la- diei walked, but owing to the steep- ness of the ascent and the high alti- tude it was particularly hard on Mrs. A. and B After leaving the eighth ion we could go only few feet without sitting down on tho retaining wall to rest. Stops at Of course, Mrs. E the to rest, about to depart and my donation to the and Mrs. A. cama in. * Jearned from them tion wa the cau of trouble in the shrine, which to me to be divided into two ¢ 5o 1 gave each Sultan 50 sen. a big donation. Now it there is some caste in that shrine, and if 1 gave one Sultan 50 sen, I should have given the other ona 25 Shrine. and ] stopped at and as we wera 1 was making Gods (?), Mr, Tha next day tha: my dona- considerabla ppeared ctions. which see shrine sen or less. Thus my ideal of. a up. I awoke about 7 p. m., arose and went outside, and soon Mr. C. joined me. We then went intc the hut and spread our grub oui on a wooden bench, and we proceeded to make a good meal, finishing off with a big piece of fruit cake. Our cooliea sat near us and watched every move we made. Mr. C. got out his cigars & a smoke. He treated the coolies to a smoke by giving them each:a hall of a cigar. They got along with them pretty well except ona fellow who made the mistake of putting tha mouth end of his portion in his mouth, but pulx as he did with all his lung power he could not make any smoke. I suggested to C. that per- haps he had not bitten of the end of it, so C. reached over and taking it from him cut off the end with his knife and gave it back to him. Well, the way that fellow then made the smoke was simply laughable, and the other coolies joined in with the loud- est guffaws one ever heard. Very soon, however, they were a silent aund a sad lot of coolies; one-half of a real cigar was too much for them. As it was bright moonlight, C. and I went out and had a good view of the crater, and it was well that wa did, for we were the only one3 in our party that saw it, though I caught one good glimpse of it the next morn- ing, August 2nd. Beautiful Scenery. Tha next morning all wera o1 deck none the worse for the wear and tear of the preceding day and the loss of their dinner of the evening before. The sky, however, was overcast, and the scuds were flying past at a mile a minute speed, and it was quite cold. We were on the very top edge of a heavy rain storm which was only like a heavy fog with very little moisture in it. It waas in a sudden lifting of this fog that I got my glimpse of th2 crater, which is 2.630 feet in diam- eter and 450 feet deep. From a dis- tance the top of Mount Fuji looks quite smooth and even, but the top edge of the crater really quite mountainous in itself. There are eight peaks around the crater, ana the hizhest peak is called Kengamina. There are a number of stone huts at the top of Fuji, which are built on the west side of a street that runs along the eastern edge of thé crater. And as one comea over tha top there are a few stone huts on the left hand side of this street. Here it in always crowded with natives who usually ar- rive in the early morning, as they seem to prefer to do their climbing at night. The stone huts, the cat- enary shaped street, the Japanet,=-ith their various garbs and conical pointed straw hats, or none at all, makes one of the most picturesqua scenei 1 ever saw. Of course, everyone wants to get a red stamp put on their staff, and after we had worked long and hard to gzet into one of the stone huts where we were told this work was done, we were informed that their work had ceased for the tima being and that we would have to go into a hut on the opposite side of the street where a relief gang was working. So we crowded in thera and wae finally secured the coveted red stamp for a consideration. It i1 always a cwn- sideration out here. Begina Descent. As there waa nothing else to keep us here any longer, we rounded up our goriki and began our descent to Kami-Yoshida. A1 we descended the mountain we got into the rain storm, which became almost a driving down- pour by the tima we had descended 2,000 feet. At the eighth station we branched off to the left and took the Yoshida trail, and here ia where the guides were real servicable as_ t A. was even worse than Mrs. B. we neared the bottom of the ashes we saw snowdrifta that have been 20 feet deep. In could not estimate their real dep we did not know how deep were below the ashes. At came to a rest house on edge of the scrub bush line here we rested for awhile. leaving here we soon entered the timber and while the ground hard it was wet, slippery clay, was not much of an impro over the ashes. However, & awhile we came to the first, on the Yoshida trail, which seme five or six miles from th tel in Kami-Yoshida. After ant eating, Mr. C. proposed thi take a Basha from there on, we did. A basha is a thing to remem And the thing to stamp ig o on one’s mind is to ride { : in one. A bashd is a sm: wheeled covered wagon without springs. We selected one; di with the driveri«as to the pris taking us to .the hotel in Yosh which being satisfactory to N parties, we were ready to board basha and enjoy ourselves. As I looked at that little called a basha, I thought the comfortable seat would be to si the floor and let my feet hang the tail eni of it. So I took out] tail-board, which was a piece lumber about twenty-eight inc} long and six inches high, and Mr, and I plunked ourselves down the tail end of the basha, and kept on going down until stopp Mother Earth, and the horse as high up in the air as we W down, much to the consternation the owner of the outfit and the Id laughter of the ever-present of natives, including our own Six people, Americans, was over-load for the basha, so the er walked on ahead to lead the Iif horse. Fortunately, it was do: all the way to the hotel, but wagon body was so low that would drag on the ground would have to hold them up tending my legs outward. Well, was the hardest and most pa ride I ever had. It simply intense torture after awhil never felt so glad in all my I did when we arrived at our ation—a Japanese hotel in Before I close this day, I tell you that we met Donald Tho m) son, the motion picture man, is touring the world taking pict for the movies. He had a room to ours at the hotel in Suba and we met him three times. Mount Fuji, where he was waiti for an opportunity to take some tures. 5 » Clear Day. The next day, August third, bright and clear, and we started our way for Lake Shoji by way ¢ the lakes which I will mention we come to them. At the hof Asakabe—we chartered two only one horse tram cars, the only kind thi have, to take us to Futnatsu on Lak] Hawaguchi, which is about six from Yoshida. One car was u a passenger car and the other baggage car, and both of them full. Picture No. 3 shows the of the cars, but the horses do appear in this photo. It shows coolies from the hotel with our ba gage on their backs, and for a won der there is not a crowd of Jap neseh cildren around. 5 In Boats. - 4 At Funatsu we chartered two boats to take us across Lake Kawaguch a distance of about four miles. f lake is 2,700 feet above the of the sea. We landed at a little village call Nagahama, and from here we wa! over Torrizaka Pass to Lake Nishi noumi, a distance of about one and one-half miles. Looking back from the top of the Pass we had a most magnificent view of the lake we had, just crossed and the green mouns tains on the other side of it. At Saibo we again chartered boats to take us the length of Lake: Nishinoumi, which is 3,000 feet abo sea level. We disembarked at & small village called Nemba, and aft= er a short walk we arrive in fromt of a small wayside shrine where we had our tiffin, or lunch. 5 here we had a five-mile walk ti Shoji, which is 3,000 feet above level. This walk was over a trail, and through a beautiful ed country. At Lake Shoji. Arrived at Lake Shoji, the hail the hotel on the opposite