Mid-December.

The Aozasa trailhead. As always Red-Coat Jizo was there to welcome me to the neighborhood.

I could stand there and smile at him forever. His spirit imbues the whole mountain. A bit of snow on his cap this day.

There’d been a good bit of rain a couple of days before, and then the sun was supposed to be out, so I headed to Aozasa thinking that the views of Fuji, with a heavy snow cap, would be magnificent.

I wasn’t expecting at all what I saw: the trees atop Shimojumaisan, just across from the trail up to the Jizo Pass, all iced up and frosty.

There’d been a little snow . . . but very little. 

The blues were lovely, as I’d expected . . . except where Fuji-kun was situated. All about him were thick grey clouds.

So a day intended for Fuji-watching, turned into a day to be fascinated by the beauty of the ice on the limbs beneath a blue-blue sky.

Really, really beautiful.

I’d asked a number of different folks to come along, but everyone was busy, so I was all by my lonesome.

Though far from lonely. Solitude, Mr. Thoreau called it.

I know it was a good day for fanciful thought because twice after removing my glove to take a picture, I dropped it and left it behind and didn’t realize I didn’t have it until I’d gone along for ten or fifteen minutes. Each time. Just the chance for a little more exercise!

No, of course I’m not absent-minded, just a deep-diving daydreamer. Especially under blue like this.

When I reached the top of Aozasa, Fuji-kun was still hiding in the grey.

And then he wasn’t. How nice it was to see him!

Will be back to Aozasa soon. Will likely be some yuki ga arukiyasui snow by then.