Things to Do in Aokigahara Forest

Six things worth the walk, what each one costs in time and yen, and how they assemble into a half day or a full one.

The Sea of Trees Nature Trail

The signed walking route through the heart of the forest is the thing most people come for and the thing most people underestimate. It is flat, wide and easy, the canopy closes over you within a few minutes of the trailhead, and it carries no fee and no closing time.

An hour covers a comfortable loop. The surface is lava the whole way, so it is uneven and it is slick in rain, but nothing about it is difficult in decent shoes.

Koyodai Lookout

A short climb up from the road to the one viewpoint that explains the name. From the top the canopy runs unbroken to the foot of the mountain, moving in the wind the way water does, and on a clear day the cone stands directly behind it.

Twenty minutes up, twenty back, and it is the single best photograph available here. Go early: the cloud that hides Mount Fuji tends to build through the morning.

The three caves in one afternoon

Narusawa Ice Cave, Fugaku Wind Cave and Saiko Bat Cave are linked by marked forest paths, and doing them on foot in sequence turns three fifteen-minute visits into a proper half day. The walking between them is the best part of it.

Allow three to four hours for all three with the walking included, plus 350 yen at each door. Between December and mid-March the bat cave is shut and the other two make a comfortable two-hour version.

Lake Saiko and Lake Motosu

The forest runs down to the shore of Lake Saiko on its northern edge, and Lake Motosu — the deepest and clearest of the Fuji Five Lakes — lies beyond its western end. Both give you the open water and the mountain view that the forest itself, by its nature, cannot.

Several of the longer departures pair a forest walk with time on one of the lakes, which is the most natural combination available here.

Saiko Iyashi-no-Sato Nenba

A rebuilt thatched-roof village on the western shore of Lake Saiko, with craft workshops and small museums in the houses and the mountain framed behind it. It was reconstructed after the original settlement was destroyed by a typhoon, and it works as a genuine change of pace after a morning under the trees.

Ninety minutes is enough. It appears on two of the private departures here, both of which put the forest first and the village second.

Half a day, and a full one

A half day is the trail, the lookout and two caves. A full day adds the third cave, a lake shore and the village, and still leaves you back at Kawaguchiko before the light goes.

Where to eat, and where not to count on it

There is a restaurant and a shop at Michi-no-eki Narusawa, and small kiosks at the cave entrances that sell drinks and not much else. Inside the forest itself there is nothing at all, which surprises people who have walked in expecting a cafe at the far end.

Carry water and something to eat if you are doing all three caves on foot. The hoto noodle restaurants around Kawaguchiko are the local speciality and they are a far better lunch than anything at the trailheads.

When the weather turns

Rain changes almost nothing here except the footing. The canopy takes the worst of it, the caves are indifferent to what the sky is doing, and the moss is at its best wet. Only the lookout is genuinely spoiled, because cloud closes the view.

Swap the viewpoint for the third cave and the day still works. How to Get There covers the buses, Aokigahara Forest Tours compares every departure, and the safety page sets out what wet lava asks of your shoes.