At the peak, I drank another toast to the Quest of the Quaich, and my friends, the rabble at XMTS.







At the top of Shosenkyo (but not the peak of Yasaburo) is also a curious, little Shinto fertility shrine. I won't say much about it, other than that it's important to remember that Japanese people do not share the same Judeo-Christian heritage that Westerners do… Things like this make us giggle!



The next photo…. Umm.. It's not that it's not safe for work or anything like that… But I want to be sensitive to others as well. I realize this is a family-friendly site. So I will describe the photo to you in words, and if you decide that you are alright with it, go ahead and click through. The shrine contains a rather oddly-shaped tree stump; some might say that it could be taken to be the form of human genitalia, and wrapped with sacred rope and sacred rice paper…

http://img43.imageshack.us/i/dscf1847e.jpg

On my way racing down the mountain to catch the sunset at Mt. Fuji, I couldn't help but stop to pose with her in the background, and Kofu City, which has been my home for almost the past decade.





With the sun rapidly dipping beneath the mountains, I caught one more daylight shot of Fuji when I got quite close. It's actually quite difficult to get a good shot without there being buildings and power lines in the way… But get TOO close, and you need a crazy wide-angle lens just to make it fit into the photo frame…



One of the sunset shots I took at Lake Yamanakako. This is truly a great place to experience a Mt. Fuji sunset, and I made it just in time.



Then, as I said in the logbook, I posed with the Quaich one last time and drank one final toast before packing her back in the box, ready to ship to Australia.