Japanese trails and world's national park's trails.

Japanese Mountain trails, especially in Hodaka mountains

I heard that Korean hiker had sued Japanese National Park for NOT closing the trail gate on bad weather. Seeing Korean trails in Bukhansan National Park, I see the big picture.

In Japan, judgement is done by each hikers because how much risk you can take is depend on your physical strengths, walking skills, climbing skills not only on objective danger such as weather, bad trails, steepness, and loose rock and crowds.


So you need to know in advance, how much risk you can take, in the particular mountains. Each trail has a different difficulty and it is not on a course guide signs on the mountains it is only be seen in the internet...

See here for grading in the Japanese mountains.

https://www.pref.nagano.lg.jp/…/k…/documents/english2018.pdf

https://www.pref.nagano.lg.jp/…/rokken_hyakumeizan_ichiran.…

Japanese grading is much more complicated so you will need a certain experience to apply the grades to yourself too.

For your info, in Japan, "average hiker" means someone who can walk up hills 300m height gained in 1 hour. So you can go nearest easy mountain and take the time. If you take more than one hour to gain 300m, you are below average, in physical strengths. So you'd like to add 1 or 2 hours extra time to hike up the mountain you like to climb.

Skill difficulty is a different story and if you are unsure about trail's objective difficulty, you'd better train yourself in climbing gym with easy 9th or 10th grade or easiest 2 grades...since in Japan, such difficulty is not prepared for unskilled hikers. I saw Korean trails has stairs and handrails and it was not even a climbing grade, so it is pretty safe. No risk of falling off the mountains. In Japan we don't have those.

I think risk of bad weather is hiker's cost in Japan, you are expected to study weather forecast before hand, or even expected to be able to read the weather chart.

I have Australian mountain, New Zealand's mountain experience when I was just a tourist, and I felt no danger nor a risk. It was only an extension of sightseeing, but in Japan, you would be asked to equipped with a minimum knowledge and skills and minimum training... if you show up in the Japanese mountain without rain wear, head light, some water and food, you are considered "irresponsible ignorant hiker".

A lot of cases, outside of japan, showing up with sneakers and blue jeans are OK. You are an average hikers.

So know the difference is what we need here.