Volcano of the Week #9- Mount Fuji

It has been a while since I've done this feature some would say too long, some would say not long enough and most were probably blissfully unaware that it ever was a feature. I thought I'd write about what (for reasons that I am about to describe) is fast becoming my favourite volcano, you can vote for your favouritcano at the link at the side. My love of Mount Fuji has started partly because I got two Christmas presents relating to it (boxcano and diarycano, see the post a couple down) and is probably after Vesuvius the most common volcano in popular culture. The most famous representations of Mount Fuji are two series both called Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji by Hokusai (boxcano) and Hiroshige (diarycano), if this is making sense to anyone I'll be impressed. Below is an image from each of those series. 

 Hokusai- The Great Wave. Which is apparently the best painting ever, obviously after Rolf Harris' portrait of The Queen

Twilight Hill- Hiroshige (the other chap)

Fuji is a stratovolcano which is 60 miles outside Tokyo so overlooks the city, making it such a prominent feature in Japanese culture. At 3,776m it's Japan's highest point, it's last eruption was in 1707. The Aokigahara forest at the base of Fuji is surrounded by myths of supernatural beings and in recent times it's gained a reputation as the world's second most popular suicide site after Golden Gate Bridge. The forest is incredibly dense, the floor consists of hard volcanic rock and has signs urging potential suicidees to reconsider. The trees are mainly white cedar, pine and boxwood. I guess there are pro and cons to the volcanic soil and amazing flora there but all I can find out about is suicides so if anyone who has like a degree in Plant Science wants to tell me about the flora that'd be great. The younger Fuji was formed mainly between 11,000 to 8,000 years ago, flank vents were formed between 2000 and 3000 years ago, the 1707 eruption created a new crater. 

Aokigahara Forest

 Massively Japanese