2013-12-01 滝子山

Quick hike to Takiko-san

It has been a while since the last time I started a hike as it was already lights out, actually almost 2 months. I've seen the sunrise in Tanigawa and Yatsugatake and I went to a snow hike also in Akadake, each time the weather was fantastic and the landscapes breathtaking. But taking 100+ pictures with tripod or walking on ice with crampons didn't make for a good cardio hike, so this time I went for a fast-pace day-hike.

After getting in the first train I reached Sasago station (600m) shortly after 7 AM. The first 2.5 kilometers on road make for a nice warm up and from the trailhead it starts steep up to the first summit 笹子雁ヶ腹摺山 (1357m) which is notable for its length: 7 kanji (I can't remember having seen any mountain name close to this long).

From this summit there was a nice view of the South Alps (mainly Shirane sanzan and Kaikomagatake). Shirane sansan are covered in deep snow but Kaikoma is still mainly gray which makes me wonder if it's possible to go there in 2 week?? Fuji-san was quite imposing towards the South. A lot more mountains to the East were also visible.

From there the next 2 kilometers have a lot of steep ups-and-downs, since the trail is in the forest I could never guess how long it would be before it changes to an uphill or downhill and had to readjust the length of the trekking poles at least ten times. The overall majority of the trail (except from the first summit and Takikosan) had no views and I decided to pack my camera to walk faster. Although steep up to お坊山 the trail suddenly changes and the following downhill is very gentle and ideal for a jog.

The uphill towards Ootanigamaru (1643) is all but flat except for the last stretch. The last bit is quite steep and also slippery. Actually most of the trail is covered with a thick layer of fallen leaves ( in Tokyo one could easily forget it's autumn considering the devotion of all the neighbor communities and city staff who will discard any single fallen leave … on a daily basis) so fallen leaves is similar to snow, it can be slippery and you cannot see what's below which means it can be treacherous.

At Ootanigamaru (the highest point of my day) there was nothing to see so I went back down a few meters to get a shot of the Alps once more. Then I moved towards Takikosan (1620m) which is probably the most famous mountain of the area (2 reasons for that, a- its name is in bold on the map b- it was crowded when I got there around 12). From Takiko we could see mountains in all directions, I noticed that from there it almost looked as if there was no snow on Yatsugatake.

From Takikosan the downhill is very agreeable and suitable for running. I passed a few Obasan who probably didn't understand what was happening, the bear bell proved very useful again.

The last part is a road and I followed turn by turn indications on my cellphone, this led me to the station but on the wrong side and it took me 5 more minutes to get to the other side. In the end I just missed the train due to this navigation error and had to wait for the next one a good 30 minutes. I hiked mostly with 2 layers this time, the hardshell and 2 other layers in the pack but the wait for the train was the coldest part of my day although it was quite warm in terms of temperature.



Time stats
Map time Actual time
笹子駅→笹子雁ヶ腹摺山 2:40 1:25
笹子雁ヶ腹摺山 → 大谷ヶ丸 5:05 2:29
大谷ヶ丸　→　滝子山 1:10 0:36
滝子山　→　初狩駅 　2:40 1:30
Total 11:35 6:22 (including breaks) = Map time * 55%

Total distance: 20 km
Total elevation change: 1900m

Overall the hike was too short and the landscapes not up to what I've seen recently.

More pictures here: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/r8wh73ki7u4gb0l/w5Pvf0GzzV