lost or what?

Hinatawada station. There is a convenience store 500m back towards Tokyo along the main road.

Photo of the day is the gorge view at Hinatawada. I have many great gorge shots along this train line that goes to Okutama.

The view in the other direction is also good, but the direction of the sun makes it less spectacular.

I passed the 'plum park' and realised I had been there before, by accident! A few years ago the train stopped at this station due to typhoon damage a few days prior. I did not know it was going to stop, so I was mad that my hiking plans for that day were ruined, so I looked on the map and saw the plum park. Today I went past it again and remembered that story, I can look it up using the search and reminisce, I will do that later.

Here is the start of the hiking trail proper, time to unleash the bear bell.

It was a great trail immediately. I saw only 2 other people before Hinodesan, so for 2.5 hours.

There was a shrine of sorts along the way.

The shrine had a view. A bit of hazey cloud was rolling in making the sky less blue.

Logging often provides the only view, today it was not the only view, but just one of the views.

Lots of logging.

I was surprised to come to this road. It is for logging of course, and there are many gates to stop cars, but you can walk on it and probably cycle on it.

If you like tree roots you will enjoy today's hike.

Here is the last bit to get to the top of Hinodesan, it is very developed.

There are people at the top. Most have come from nearby Mitake and have taken the cable railway up. There are lot of people between Hinodesan and Mitake with little dogs.

Before much longer I too was on the top of Mitake. This cat came to greet me. There is a little village at the top and big shrine, all of which I have photographed before. A lot of the staircases were being repaired so I got lost.

There is even a street full of little shops. With a permit you can drive up here, I have walked down the twisty road from here twice before, not today though!

Here is the way up to the main shrine.

There is not really a good view spot from the shrine at the top, but here is the shrine for the sake of completeness.

Best I can do for a view.

Now on my previous trips, I have taken the twisty access road down, where as today I am continuing further west. So today I actually went past the cable train station area, which has this view.

Here is the cable train station area, the actual shed it comes and goes from is to my left, but you can not actually see it until you pay for a fare. I did not know until today that there are also chair lifts to take you up to the top of the shrine area from the cable car station.

Here is the highest point of today's hike, Otsuka. It is not very high and has no view.

Just below the Otsuka summit is this abandoned picnic area, covered in rust and moss like they all are these days.

The path down was through more logging area, but we are not out of the woods yet! I cannot believe I have never actually typed that on this website before.

It took quite a while to get all the way down, but eventually I popped out of the forest at Kori.

Time to cross the Tama river and check out the gorge from here. Not as good as earlier due to the hazey sky.

Kori station in all it's glory. I had to wait 30 minutes for a train so headed across the road to 7-eleven and bought some chocolate coated banana chips.

Now full of chocolate and deep fried bananas I had just enough time to stand on the train overpass and take a shot of the village of Kori before boarding for the long 2 hour journey back to Tokyo. Now I will go and see if I can get arrested for illegally participating in Halloween, some say I always look like I am wearing a scary costume.