The sunrise on New Year's Day is called hatsuhinode. Isn't it amazing if it's "Diamond Fuji"?
Fujisan Curator began the year 2022 with a Mt. Ryugatake hiking tour for a client to watch the first sunrise of the year in the form of “Diamond Fuji”.
To deliver such special tour contents or accomplish that mission, the specific date, time, and location are among the requirements, and uncontrollable external conditions such as weather also need to cooperate.
To get further into it, here are some basics first.
Hatsuhinode refers to the appearance of the sun on the 1st of January (ganjitsu), e.g. rising from the horizon or sea horizon.
In Japan, it is celebrated as the first crack of dawn once a year and sometimes ceremonially observed from a nearby mountaintop. There are spots for hatsuhinode throughout the whole country, and lots of people visit them to see it.
Represented by an act of watching hatsuhinode (the first sunrise of the new year) or greeting a sunrise from the top of Mt. Fuji with a prayer, the sunrise belief (sun belief) is said to be peculiar to Japan while there are a lot of practices of admiring the setting sun all over the world.
And as for the Diamond Fuji, please check my earlier post, Sunrise Diamond Fuji in the fall.
The tour was planned and organized so the client could enjoy the following experience.
Viewing Mt. Fuji
Watching Diamond Fuji
Observing the first sunrise of the New Year
And putting No.2 and 3 together was most important.
I left home a little after 4 am to pick up the client at a hotel they stayed. The outside temperature was -10 degrees Celsius, which was very cold, but it was better with this temperature because the clear blue sky without clouds was certain.
After 1.5 hours or so of hiking along the ridges, enjoying the gorgeous gradation of color in the twilight, we firmly fixed ourselves in the right position and waited for the moment to seize this exceptional occasion, only once a year.
On the way down the mountain, we took a different route from the way up and went down the trail marked by frost pillars, looking down on Lake Motosuko peeking out from between the trees in the winter forest with frozen fallen leaves.
After descending from the mountain, we took a short detour on the way back to the north shore of Lake Motosuko. With the surface of the lake glistening in the light of the sun risen high, Mt. Ryugatake beside the lake, and the panoramic view of snow-capped winter Mt. Fuji in the background, it was a nice way to end the tour.
Mt. Ryugatake is one of the best places in Japan to go to see the first sunrise of the year. Rising very early and hiking in the cold are well worth the effort as you will be rewarded with a glorious view of Diamond Fuji.