Hyakumeizan, Hiking Japan!

All I wanted was to know where that mountain was...

This website is dedicated to Japan's 100 most famous mountains (日本百名山, Nihon Hyaku-meizan), a list of mountains depicted inthe 1964 collection of essays by Mountaineer/Author Kyuya Fukada. The book became famous when Crown Prince Maruhito expressed his interest on it. Mr. Fukada's list has been the topic of Japanese documentaries plus a growing number of hiking books. The image on the left is the Commemorative stamp issued in 2003 for the Centenary of the Birth of Fukada Kyuya.

Who is behind this site?

An American who came to work to Northern Japan, who took a bit of curiosity a bit too far :}.  What began as a search for a single mountain turned up references to the list, but with few (often contradictory) English resources. My searches turned into hundreds of saved bookmarks, which where sorted into folders, which were validated against paper maps, which turned into spreadsheets, which were in turn feeded into a database. Yes, this is what happens when you give a computer geek a bit of data to play with. Eventually while sitting atop all of my beautiful mountain data I figured, heck, I'm a web developer, I'll develop this into something! So here I am and there you are.

Disclaimer

The information here is provided AS-IS, without any guarantees as to accuracy of usability for any purpose whatsoever. Why? Because if I were you, I would not go out there in the dead of winter to attempt to find a mountain hut solely based on some Geo location you found on this site. If you get lost and lose a toe or two, don't come back to blame it on me.

Plans for the future

1. For starters to take a break. A lot of my spare time went into the research you are looking at, not to mention the needed programming to bring it all together. Towards the end it began to feel more like work than fun, so for now I will leave it (mostly) alone and go and enjoy the powder at the Hakkoda mountains.
2. To gather feedback. So far I have been working on a vacuum; I need comments and suggestions to help fix both the content and the useability of this site.
3. To fill in the blanks. A lot of the mountain data is still missing, such as basic information, how to get there, trail conditions, better map overlays, and quite a bit more. For an example of what all the mountain entries should look like, take a look at the details o nHakkoda, my local stumping grounds.
4. To think whether or not to expand this site. There is plenty that can be said about the 100 mountains, but any collection of Japanese walking destinations could be fair game.