take me here – Page 2

cassiachloe:

For the last four nights and five days I’ve been hiking the mountains of a small subtropical island at the southern most part of Japan home to deep forests, high mountains and some of the world’s oldest trees, the eldest potentially up to 7200 years. These are the very forests which inspired the Ghibli film Princess Mononoke. With myself and a backpack full of tofu, I’ve been following mountain trails through the woodlands, meeting all the eldest trees, spending each night in unattended log huts with no electricity or running water, drinking clean water from the rivers and springs, climbing the highest mountain peak, at points there were no paths and I was basically abseiling down a rock face or just clambering rocks and tree roots. The woods so deeply alive and rich; every tree giving life to moss and a thousand tiny plants on each branch. So breathing and interconnected, I soon felt myself somewhat a part of that ecosystem, exchanging air and water. During those days I didn’t see many people, just the company of the rivers song and droplets of rain on my hut, unafraid fawn-like small deer often crossed my path, the occasional mouse scrounging around my bag in the night, little red-faced monkeys greeted me on entrance and exit of the woods, and of course the ancient cedars were ever humbling me. At one point the wind was really singing. During that time I had 3 full days hiking, in which I covered 32.4km at some pretty tough inclines, reaching my highest point of 1936m. With 5 days of food and warmth in my backpack, entirely but not at all alone. Meeting old wooden friends and Kodama in dreams and dark nights.

Yakushima