Will have to return

We turned back and returned to the 5th station. Not sure where we made the wrong turn. May try to figure that out after a snack. One positive - we will make the last express bus back to Shinjuku and will be back at our hotel by 6 PM.

Sam was a real trooper. Once we realized that we had made a mistake that would cost us our chance to approach the summit, there were some tears of disappointment. But, then she said "we'll have to come back again so we can climb to the top." That's my girl!

We did find the correct trailhead at the other end of the parking lot. In hindsight, it's obvious. But, at the time, our nicely groomed and marked trail seemed like the main one. We did see about 7 people who made the same mistake as us.

I spoke to some guys who did climb today. They said that the trail was very rough after the 7th station. They stopped after 8. Sam admitted that she'd have to do some training in order to make it as she was pretty tired after only an hour.


In the end, we had a very nice mountain hike, with a picnic all by ourselves. The weather was much warmer and nicer than I expected. And, it looked like rain was coming soon by the time we left. If we had gone the right way as far as the 8th station, we would have probably got stuck in a downpour. So, we ended our day with a mixture of disappointment and happiness.