No hiking this week-end but free climbing. It has been a while since I’ve been rock climbing and it was great ! We chose to go to Ogawayama (小川山), north of Kinpu-san (金峰山, also pronounced Kinpō-san) East of the Okuchichibu-sankai mountain range (奥秩父山塊), maybe the largest rock climbing site in Japan (it is said to have more than 700 climbing routes). Two days is not enough, especially when coming from Tōkyō. So I took my Friday off to try to enjoy it the most I could. As it’s the summer vacations, we were expecting the area to be packed with climbers, but the mixed weather forecast might have discouraged most of them. Good for us, we could climb routes one after the other quietly.

Amongst the satisfaction of this three days of climbing:

• sit astride the very sharp summit ridge of Mara-Iwa rock (マラ岩), even if we climbed to the top by the easiest route (5.8) which is poorly equipped and absolutely unsecured (I don’t think I’ll ever climb it again),
  
• the five pitch long Gama-route (ガマ・ルート) (up to 5.9), even if it was crowded as the sun had dried the slabs and there are not that many easy five pitch long routes. The summit of the Gama rocks with an about 50 meters vertical drop and its panorama on the valley was also impressive.
  

Safety

Warning, routes are poorly equipped. Although in order to prevent climbers from falling down to the ground, the equipment of routes means that the first bolt anchor is not too high and that the second one is close to the first one, it is not the case here. First bolts are already pretty high and it’s the same for the second ones. So if you fall before reaching the second bolt, you will fall down to the ground. In addition to this, bolts are not necessarily placed on sections where it is easy to free a hand and clip a quickdraw (extender). I have the feeling that bolts have simply been placed at regular intervals ignoring climbers safety. Although such one-pitch rock climbing are usually a perfect place to try, even as a lead climber, to climb routes for which you have just or not yet the level and as such, progress, it is not possible here.

As routes are not equipped in a secured way, having your own protection (cams & nuts) is recommended.
Also belay stations are sometimes in very poor conditions, especially ropes used to link bolts , and you shouldn’t trust them. I recommend to climb with some piece of ropes (that you buy by meters) that you can leave to resecure or change the ones already in place. It’s better than living expensive slings like I had to do.

Information about Ogawayama

• A web site in English publishes information about climbing routes: http://www.ogawayama.com/. The amount of information and details gathered is pretty impressive!
• There is no guide book dedicated to Ogawayama. The most complete one is Nihon Hyaku Iwaba 3: Izu/Koushin (フリークライミング　日本100岩場・3　伊豆・甲信) – ISBN 4635180832.