Climbing Mt. Omifuji & Mikami Shinto Shrine

Will and I responded to a flier, "Climbing Mt. Omifuji & Mikami Shinto Shrine" from the Kyoto Guide Club.  This volunteer group carefully planned a day-long outing.  It was promoted,"Have you ever been attracted by Greek Mythology or Roman Mythology? There was a similar one in Japan, too."

Apparently the great grandchild of Amaterasu (the sun goddess) landed on Mt. Mikami from Heaven.  This area was sort of a playground for gods and nobles where they played, hunted and wrote poetry.

For this human outing, folks met at the main Kyoto Station at 9:00 -- checked in with a person with a clipboard, and got name tags.  I think our group was about 24 people -- maybe 8 Japanese from the committee/club.  The rest of us were from Bahrain, Czech Republic,  Belgium, France, Hong Kong, Serbia, Cameroon, and the US (Will and Peg).

We took a train ride of about 45 min, prayed at the appropriate shrine for caution and good fortune with the hike.  Then we took short taxi ride, then a bathroom stop and a stop at a combini (convenience store) in case anyone needed more water or forgot to pack a lunch.  From there we hiked at a good clip up this fairly steep mountain.  With a little more understanding of what we were getting into, I would have brought my hiking poles.  The pace was fast, and Will lagged a bit, but they had build in a couple of rest stops.  There was a spectacular view from the top.  the pace was fast on the way down too, and it was even steeper.  I gave my ankle a minor twist, but kept going.

The route we had hoped to take back had been washed out by the typhoon, so we took a combined road/path around the mountain to return.  For some time we walked along a strong fence which was designed to  keep the wild boar out of the rice fields.  The women hand harvesting the rice were covered very traditionally in layers of clothes, and a wide brimmed bonnet, so that no sun would get on any part of their bodies.

All in all , this was a successful international outing -- with a chance to speak informally to folks from several countries.