Mount Fuji has been worshipped from afar, feared as a volcano, and climbed as devotion since the Heian period, when the mountain ascetics made its slopes a training ground; the Edo era's confraternities turned the ascent into group pilgrimage, their lodges seeding the trail system still in use. Women were barred from the summit for centuries, one recorded her climb in 1832, and the formal prohibition was abolished by state edict in 1872.

Today the mountain is a UNESCO cultural landscape whose component sites include the trailhead shrines and the lava caves of the worship tradition, and it is also a case study in managed pilgrimage: every trail now charges an access fee, the most popular route requires reservations and caps its daily climbers, and off-season ascent is actively discouraged. The sunrise seen from the summit remains the ritual heart of the climb.

Visiting

Climbing runs early July through mid-September; the official climbing guide covers the four trails, the reservation system, and the per-person access fee; the most popular trail requires advance booking.

Photo: [Wikimedia Commons](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Mount_Fuji), CC BY-SA 4.0.

Associated traditions & practices

Shinto & Shugendō Sacred Site Pilgrimage

Traditions from this region

Traditions historically rooted in this region — offered as background context, not as a claim about this particular place.

Esoteric Buddhism