Three baby boomers in the Japan Alps

	Three baby boomers in the Japan Alps		Yamayuri by YK
	+ + + First Boomer + + + When dinner was served outside at four o’clock in the afternoon, warm sunlight of the Southern Alps fell on the outdoor wooden tables of the mountain lodge. One couple came to the table a little late. He and his wife looked very shy and they found two open seats next to us saying “… excuse us”. The owner of the mountain lodge repeatedly said that “there are only a few days in a year like today - such a completely fine day with no clouds and simply beautiful blue sky.　You’d better leave here very early tomorrow morning in order to reach the summit of Kaikoma - 2,969 meter peak - before ten o’clock, before the weather changes. Breakfast will be at four o’clock in the morning.” The couple looked at each other and whispered to me that they did not get the idea of a four o’clock breakfast and that they had no handy light or headlights. We found that they live in Nishiogi, fifteen minutes by car from our home, and he is the same age as me. When my partner and I left the lodge with our headlights after breakfast, it was 4:20 a.m., the couple told me that they were going back to the room to wait for the sun rise. “Good bye, take care of yourself” we exchanged greetings. We passed an interim peak named Komatsumine - a 2,740 meter elevation point - at 6:24, and could finally reach the summit of Kaikoma at 7:58 after three and a half hours of climbing. We could really enjoy the perfect 360-degree bird’s eye view for a while.		the sunrise
	After returning from the summit, we were taking a break with a drink at Komatsumine - where the road parted into 2 ways--the path to the lodge and another path for the Kitazawa-Peak. We were just about to descend the path for Kitazawa-Path, which is another way at the branch point, when I saw a couple coming slowly to the peak of Komatsumine. We realized that they were the couple, whom I decided to call the “Nishiogi Fifty-Five Team”. It was approximately five hours and forty minutes after we said “Good bye” to each other. According to him, they left the lodge around six o’clock and needed almost four hours to get here. He asked me how long and hard it is from here to the summit of Kaikoma. We encouraged them to make it to the peak and exchanged greetings again. And then we started to descend the hill toward Kitazawa, a 2,030-meter elevation peak, where we were staying the night.		the lodge
	+ + + Second Boomer + + + Six visitors were sitting in a line in front of the dinner table on the Tatami room. It was four thirty in the afternoon - twelve hours after we left the first lodge. A daughter of the lodge founder - her grandfather was a pioneer and guide for Japanese Southern Alps - served us a bowl of vegetable soup - a rich soup like minestrone based on miso (soy beans paste). She emphasized how we were lucky not only with the weather but also timing, “We have only six visitors today, so I can serve you easily. 　We, however, have to take care of more than seventy visitors tomorrow and on Sunday over fifty people!” Seven o’clock was the time for lights-out. During dinner, two senior gentlemen - looked like over sixty years old or so - took the lead for conversation. After dinner we chatted with a relatively younger couple. I wondered why they were able to come to this mountain area on a week day. Reading my mind, his partner quickly explained, “He is a ‘window-side employee’ (side-tracked employee), so it’s easy to take time off.” He added that he decided to resign the company and submitted a letter of resignation to his boss. The boss, however, did not accept the letter and suggested that he stay with the company even if it meant a ‘window-side employee.’ All of us listened his story without saying a word. My partner told him that her partner (me) did the same thing - wrote a letter of resignation - and left the company. By then, we both found out he is the same age as me and his partner is also the same age as my partner. Sipping a glass of whisky, he murmured, “What a strange coincidence to bump into someone with such many similarities” We left the lodge before five o’clock the next morning just exchanging some words “Good bye, see you again if we have a chance.” Against a very strong wind, we headed to the summit of a 3,033 - meter elevation mountain - Senjyo -. We could reach the peak around eight o’clock. Although the view was completely clear, it was hard to keep standing due to the strong wind. Right after taking a few photos, we debated whether we should return to the path we climbed up or head to the root of the ridge which was not suggested by the mountain lodge owner, who said it would be better to return to the road we came if the wind was strong. As I was descending the very narrow path of the ridge followed by my partner, I could see a hat, bobbing up and down and a few seconds later, a man was waving the hat, shouting “Yah!.” Yes, they were the couple we talked with the very last night at the mountain lodge, the couple of the same age as us--the “Ikoma City Fifty-Five.” They came from the Kitazawa Peak, taking a clock-wise route as opposed to what we took. It was 8:30 a.m. according to the record on my digital gadget. Through conversations we exchanged in the teeth of the wind, I understood that he was an engineer of a large shipbuilding company in Osaka and created a new software business, which was recently sold to a large Internet portal company.		Mt.Senjo
	We were able to return to the Kitazawa Peak just before noon. We finally completed our three days of hiking and unbundled our backpacks on the waiting seat of the bus stop. In the Japanese Alps, only public buses - so called micro bus - are allowed to run the road to protect the natural environment. Without heavy backpack, we were able to explore fall foliage trees while waiting for our 1:15 p.m. bus. I called my wife since I could see a couple coming up the forest road toward the bus stop. Surely, they were the “Ikoma City Fifty-Five” again! We saw them off on their 1:00 p.m. bus bound for the northwest. And then we rode on the 1:15 p.m. bus to Hirogawara, a 30-minute ride southeastward from the path, where we parked our car after driving four hours from Tokyo.		the bus stop
	What is the secret of hiking or climbing that fascinates baby boomers? A world of forested mountains . . . . something very familiar, even in Tokyo during the childhood days of us baby boomers. It is much more comfortable to engage in athletic activities, sweating in a natural environment--not in a wall-to-wall sporting gym. Perhaps it is time to take a journey with your better half, not business trips, after your kids have left your nest. There must be a hundred stories for hundred boomers. Would you also like to enjoy happy hiking?
	November 2003