Mt. Gozaisho is the nearest snow-capped mountain from Nagoya. It wasn't snowing during my visit, but I expected nice views up the mountain. A cable car makes the journey easy enough, and the 15-minute ride is quite scary as it scales the topography. Gozaisho is 1212m high and is famous for its unusual rock formations and far cooler temperatues, up to 10C from the bottom.
Getting here is not too difficult. With a change of trains at Yokkaichi, it takes about an hour to reach Kintetsu's Yunoyama Onsen station.
From the terminus station, I opted to walk uphill to the ropeway, but there is also a bus that departs at less regular times.
The scale of the ascent is quite marvelous.
There were no crowds ahead of me this morning, and it was an easy way to my exclusive cable car for the long journey uphill.
We rounded a few ridges along the way and the height to the bottom seemed to increase exponentially. Luckily, the winds were calm and the whole ride was smooth.
Just outside the ropeway station at the top is the Chouyoudai Observatory. It is possible to ride a less-scary chairlift even higher.
I was more interested in views towards the sea, so hiked for a short distance to the Fujimi-iwa Observatory. If the sky was clear enough, you could even spot Mount Fuji from here, hence the name.
Mount Fuji should be somewhere behind the clouds.
Unfortunately, despite the blue sky, visibility wasn't great for me today. So I headed back downhill the same way. By now, more tourists were starting to stream uphill. I didn't have the mountains almost all to myself anymore.
Besides the ropeway, the locale also has hot springs, although it didn't look like a resort area.
