Tokyo or bust

On our way.. the four of us are enroute for Tokyo on UA #875, arriving at ~4:30 on Sunday afternoon Japan time.

Weather appears to be settling down quite a bit on Fuji, but still extremely cold. Thats ok given the protective clothes we have, and in some ways we wish that Huntington were coming along to get the campfire going for us. We were expecting him and Leonard to be re-joining us on this climb, but then they got scared and decided that the comfort of a warm bed would be better for them. Even Schactler, who broke his foot on the 20km outhike came back to try again, checking in and looking just like David Beckham. You can read all about their trevails on last years climb at: http://landtarget.blogspot.com/2008/02/negative-47.html

Snow is abating, which is good- and the winds are stronger, so I am confident that the snow that does fall will be blown straight off the mountain in time for our Tuesday attempt:


The thing that will be interesting is the mountain condition. It has changed considerably each an every winter sofar - similar to what Mt Rainier has demonstrated with snow accumulation, conditions, and ability to make the top. For example, this is what it looked like last year when it was negative 47 degrees but clear and windy as hell:



Then two winters ago, it looked like this with snow, mild temps and no wind:

Those are either my gloves, or Dana's. Hopefully it looks nothing like this at present, but if it does we are all equipped with snowshoes so no postholing will occur.

All for now, flight from Seattle is boarding in 15 minutes. All gear is checked in, laptops are charged and Dana is all set to meet us in Narita for our long bus ride into town.


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