Every morning I could look out from my ninth floor apartment directly across the city to Soranuma-dake. I could watch the seasons shift by charting the changes in the colour of the forest or the level of the snow on the peak. I also went up it a number of times in all the seasons. The imposing wooden hut is in a beautiful location and staying overnight with friends one winter was a special highlight.
The subway and bus make access easy in summer, but it helps to get the timing right. One fine day, being alone I had made good time up and down the mountain only to find I’d missed the early afternoon bus back to Makomanai by 5 minutes. Since there wasn’t another bus for three hours and an ugly quarry is hardly the place to hang around, I had to resign myself to a lengthy trudge all the way back down the road to Geijutsu no Mori. A memorable day for a different reason.
