Japan's highest mountain, climbed the traditional way: up through the night's hut lights, a few hours' sleep at altitude, and the last zigzags in the dark to watch the sun rise over a sea of clouds from the crater rim.
Fuji up close is a cinder cone: loose volcanic grit, switchbacks, mountain huts stacked on the slope and, in July and August, a lot of company. What makes it is the night and the sunrise.
The Yoshida trail starts at the Subaru Line fifth station at 2,305 metres and is the most popular of the four routes, with the most huts and the easiest access from Tokyo. Most people climb in the afternoon to a hut around the seventh or eighth station, sleep for a few hours, and set off again around 2am to reach the rim for sunrise.
The climb has been regulated since 2024: there is a fee, a daily cap and a gate that closes in the afternoon to anyone without a hut booking, to stop the "bullet climbing" that sent unprepared people up overnight without rest. Altitude is real at 3,776 metres; go slowly, drink, and turn back if your head pounds. Done properly, the climb is still one of the great sights of the country.
If you still have legs at the top, the walk around the crater, about 90 minutes, passes Kengamine, the true summit, and looks into the 200-metre-deep crater.
Up on the ascent trail, down on the separate descent trail with its long gravel zigzags.
Arrive by bus around midday, eat, and spend an hour at the fifth station before starting. Pay the fee and show your booking at the gate near the sixth station.
The trail leaves the last trees and climbs in switchbacks, then over rocky steps between a chain of huts. Views open across the Fuji Five Lakes.
Curry dinner, a bunk in a crowded dormitory, and a few hours' rest. Hut staff wake climbers in the small hours.
Climb the last section by headlamp in a slow line of lights, pass the stone torii at the top, and find a spot facing east for goraikō, the sunrise.
Optional crater walk, then down the descent trail's loose gravel bends, with no huts on the long middle section, back to the fifth station and the bus.
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Yamanashi charges ¥4,000 per climber and caps the trail at 4,000 people a day; most places are reserved online in advance. The gate closes from 2pm to 3am to anyone without a hut booking. Check the official Fuji climbing site before you go, as rules change each year.
Book early for July and August weekends. Expect roughly ¥9,000–15,000 a night with dinner, more on Saturdays. Bring cash and coins for toilets.
Highway buses run from Shinjuku Expressway Bus Terminal to the Subaru Line fifth station in about 2.5 hours during the climbing season.
Tokyo practical notes →Wikimedia Commons photographs are used under their licences.
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