Enkoji(39) Fun encounter

March 20

We stayed dry in the dressing room at the campground. The wind woke us up last night so it was great to be indoors. No one came to the campground last night.

Mihara Campground

We were hiking by 6, with the goal of visiting Temple 39. It was a chilly morning as we had gone up to a higher elevation since the coast. It was about 7:30 when we happened to walk past a residence that had a lot of displays including a large water wheel. We stopped to take a photo when we noticed a man at the top of the stairs outside a small building.

The building is the red one in the distance.

He was waving frantically at us. We weren’t sure if he wanted us to come in, or keep going. He wanted us to come in! He ran down the stairs motioning to come in the yard. He spoke a little English, but mainly it was pointing. We began slowly walking around his yard marveling at all the detailed scenarios .

Some of them even had moving parts. There were tables with elephants as the focus.

There were dog tables similar to the elephant table, At one point he motioned for us to follow him around the house. He pointed to a water fall and called it Niagara Falls.

The Falls

There was even a snowman and a tiger you could ride.

Eventually he showed us a circular maze that he wanted us to follow him

I think if we would have stayed the whole day, we would have only seen half of the displays.

After we finished going through the maze, we continued to follow him up the stairs to his Tea House.

It ws a great view to look down on all of his displays. The next question was what would you like to drink? I am thinking hot tea? green or black? Not exactly. The words out of his mouth were beer, whiskey, scotch or brandy. Mind you it is 7:30 in the morning. Don was game to have a drink. I was game to have hot water! He poured Don some Brandy with large circular ice cubes.

He told Don that he could sign his name on the bottle and when he returns here, he can finish it. We had lots of interesting conversation and he showed us articles about himself and the grounds.

We even watched a TV show that was all about the show visiting the property, At the end of the show a thumbs up or thumbs down was given about the visit. He got a big thumbs up. He told us that when the former prime minister visits his tea house, they often drink for 6 hours. I think he was disappointed when we said we needed to start walking again,

He walked us down to the road and Don mentioned that this was a great day to celebrates Donnas’s Birthday. Today is the 20th in Japan, but in the USA it is the 19th. He stops then says wait here. He runs back to his tea house and returns with a bottle of champagne, that he gives to me.

Hope we can find some friends to share this tonight.

After several hours of being entertained, it is time to be on the move. We walk past an impressive stone wall surrounding a field.

Lots of rocks made up this wall.

Got to experience more Bamboo forests.

Walking thru a small town we saw a fish market selling the types of fish that we have eaten at guest houses.

Would be interesting to see how this type of fish is prepared.

Finally we saw the goal of the day, Enkoji.(39)

One story that goes with this temple is that of the turtle that brought a bell on its back here.

We are reminded to pray for peace when we see this monument.

Some temple hondos.

We see our Japanese friend Shinshi, that we walked with before temple 37

Sounds like he is almost done with his pilgrimage. There is a good chance we won’t see him again.

We head into the town of Sukumo and find our hotel for the night. According to the guide book we have gone half the distance of the route. we are definitely feeling more comfortable traveling in Japan and the rituals of the temples. When we are signing in we see Renee. We told her of the champagne gift and invite her to our room to share it later. We meet after dinner and have a nice birthday celebration drink.

Accommodation Avan Business Hotel

Miles hiked 16

Kanjizaiji(40) sleeping in a mountain hut

March 21

It was another early departure as the day looks like it could be long. We have a destination tonight of a rest hut on the way to a mountain pass. We have several passes to go over today as well as visit a temple. We will also be crossing into Ehime prefecture. This prefecture is known as the prefecture of enlightenment. We are looking forward to see what the day has to offer.

As we turn off the road and start walking on a dirt trail, we are startled by a noise in the bushes. We stop look and listen to see a colorful pheasant appear.

We are glad to see a sign directing us on a trail through the grass. The trail is faint and difficult to see.

As we continue on this trail, there are numerous signs drawn by the children of the village encouraging us to continue on this steep path,

Some have words in English ,but most are in Japanese. The pictures that they have drawn are the best clue to what the sign is saying. The trail takes us up and then drops down into orchards before heading up again.

We liked the use of an inflatable tiger for protection of the fruit. We saw several of these tigers along the fields.

More signs, some indicating we were almost to the top.

At one point we saw the coast, where we will beading down to before we head back up into the mountains later today.

And then we made it to the top of the first pass. A bench was waiting for us. We checked out the route.

After the pass there was a sign indicating we have crossed into the Ehime prefecture. There was a well marked trail going down from the pass. Quite nice walking on a soft path.

Another sign indicating we were on the right path.

Just when we needed it, a rest area and bathroom would appear.

Often In a great place to enjoy the view.

As we were walking thru a town before Temple 40, we walked by a large grocery store, We almost kept walking, but then decided to check it out. We located the bakery area and thought their pizza looked great. It is never too early to stop for lunch. We perused the aisles and became overwhelmed with all the choices. It is so much easier to just stop at the convenience stores with a limited amount of choices. I did grab a cup of curry noodles as that has become our favorite camp meal. Chocolate is always a good choice as well. According to our guides there is a Lawson’s store right before we head into the mountains so we should be able to purchase items there for tonight. Just in case, I added a little more chocolate to our snack bag.

Kanjizaiji is the first temple in the Ehime prefecture. One interesting fact here is that there is earth from each of the 88 temples buried around the daishdo.

It has completely burned several times and in 1964 was built mostly from iron and concrete.

We always look forward to ringing the bell once to announce our presence.

This temple is well cared for. We have never seen any liter in any of the temples.

There was a tour group here. Often they are guided by a monk who leads them in chanting.

They all seem so excited to be here.

Next stop will be Lawson’s Before arriving there we pass a man putting grapefruit in the back of a truck. He motions for us to catch a couple of grapefruit that he is throwing our way.

They were as good as they look!

When we get to Lawsons, the store has a vacant look. There are some items on the shelves , but the doors are locked and no one is in the parking lot. A sign that we translate on the door says open April !st. Glad that I bought some food at the grocery store. We usually wouldn’t carry extra food if we can buy some on the way. Once again we had someone looking out for us. Next stop was across the street. We needed water for tonight and we thought all that we had to do was purchase some at the vending machine, That didn’t work either. All the buttons under the water bottles were red, meaning no water available. Back across the street was a bank with some employees. I took my empty water bottle and in sign language tried to tell them that we needed water. They understood and went to the back and got a pitcher of water. We filled up all our water bottles, thanked them and were ready to head up to the second pass of the day. It was getting late in the day and we hoped that we would get to the hut before it got dark. Luck was with us when we saw the rest area unoccupied . It was perfect, we are looking forward to sleeping surrounded by trees. We were high above the town, but at 6 we heard the loudspeaker with announcements and a song.

Home for the night.

Accommodation Mountain Hut

Miles hiked 22

RyukoinB6, Uwajima Castle

March 22

We heard the sounds of the town far below greeting the morning. We packed up and continued our climb upwards. We passed this memorial close to our hut.

When we reached the top, we could look down and see the town that we were going to spend the night.

We could have walked the coastal route to the town, if the weather had been marginal we would have. The days were sunny and we enjoyed the challenge of going up and over the mountain. We stopped to have lunch along a river and met Teru. He was standing next to the river looking perplexed. His sandwich had just been stolen out of his hand by a sea gull. He lives in Northern Japan and always wanted to do this pilgrimage. He figured he should do it before he gets any older.(62) Having spent some time in the United States he spoke good English. He walked with us for awhile. Translating some of the signs that we had been curious about.

He took our photo next to the Henro Trail sign

When we reached the town we were on the lookout for a bakery. It wasn’t long till one appeared. Again it was hard to choose just one bakery goods..

We ate outside the bakery shop and when Don went back in to throw away the packaging. We were given two popsicles as ossetai.

The town is bigger than most of the small towns we have walked thru.

When we walk thru bigger towns it is such a contrast from the rural areas. We have enjoyed the big cities as well as the smaller ones. We saw this painting on one of the buildings.

Arriving to the town by early afternoon, we found our hotel and were able to check into our room. We had two things that we wanted to do this afternoon visit Ryukoin Temple B6, one of the Bekkaku temples and the Uwajima Castle. Both were in walking distance of our hotel. The castle is located high on a hill visible from most parts of the town.. Without our backpacks, it was a nice walk.

The castle was built over 400 years ago and is one of the few castles in Japan that is in its original form. We were impressed with the stone work around the castle.

And the precision of the corner stones.

For a small fee you could enter the castle and visit the various floors. One display had the uniforms of the soldiers.

Another interesting display were the drums.

After we left the castle we made our way over to The Bekkaku 6 Ryukoin temple. We were never clear on why certain temples are included in the 88 Pilgrimage Route and others are not. On the way to to the temple we passed a house with colorful whirly gigs.

And a colorful mancover

Walking up to the gate. Pretty common to have stairs going up to the temples.

Some of the memorials on the grounds were of Shinto origin.

The roofs of the buildings are distinct.

Time to head back to the hotel and enjoy the fresh squeezed orange they have for you to try.

And pick up some bath salts to soak in the bath tub tonight.

After a refreshing bath, we thought we would go check out one of the restaurants we saw near our hotel. We walked in and asked the man behind the desk if we could have dinner there tonight. We thought he said yes and when he motioned for us to follow him and showed us where to sit we thought all ws good. He even handed us some menus. That was about as far as we got. For the next 20 minutes or so we were basically ignored. There were people who can in after us that were served. We got the hint when the waitress took the orders from the table next to us and did so by turning her back to us. Not sure what the reason was, but we just left and headed to our favorite convenience store. This is when we would really like to know more of the language. This is the second time we had the feeling that we weren’t welcomed. But there have been so many great things that have happened to us that these two situations seem so minor. Beautiful walking today and the weather was perfect.

Accommodation Oriental Hotel

Miles walked 21

Ryukoiji(41)Butsumokuji(42)Meisekiji(43 )

March 23

Somehow we had reserved a room with a single bed. It was really too small for both of us so I opted to sleep on the floor and slept just fine. The hotel had breakfast options that we had ordered last night. It was a breakfast sandwich of eggs and ham on bread that we could eat in the lobby. It worked for us as we prepared for the day. We want to visit three temples plus weather permitting go over a pass. If we go over the pass it will add about 2 more hours to our day. We check out some ducks swimming in a little creek beside us.

It seems like everywhere we travel, we see our friend the Mallards swimming in the water,

Temple 41 and 42 are relatively close together so we should be able to visit them this morning..The first temple has a red Tori gate at the top of the stairs.

It seems that some of these temples are shared with the Shinto religion. It is always interesting to look at the different statues located around the temples.

A lot of the temples are located above the towns.

The blue writings on the pillars in front of this hall stood out.

Praying for Peace is always written on our name slips and placed in the silver containers in front of the hall.

Lots of origami cranes for thinking about Peace.

We leave this temple and head down thru town to the next temple.

Houses below the Temple

Walking to the town we pass a green house that has numerous fruit trees that can be put under the cover. The branches of the trees are grown horizontal along bars. We would like to learn more about this technique.

The next temple was located less than a mile away. It is for the health of your animals, especially cows. Here we meet Jean-Pierre and Anne from France. They did half of the pilgrimage last year and plan to finish it this year. They are staying at our hotel tonight and told us that the hotel has a good buffet in the dining room for breakfast and dinner. Good to know!

This temple has the only bell tower that has a roof made out of reeds.

Lots more statues.

Most of the buildings in this temple ground were close together surrounded by trees.

This was one of our favorite statues. The fun of fishing.

The weather was now raining and as we headed up the mountains to go over a pass we would have to decide if we wanted to go thru the tunnel or take a longer route that would take us to the top of a mountain and then down.

Today on our way up to the pass we get to see and use the lone vending machine that is just along a highway.

There are a lot of vending machines in Japan. Each one seems to have a variety of selections. One can usually depend on seeing coffee, tea, and water. The other selections are surprise selections of different juices and sodas. Each vending machine has a container beside it to put in the can or bottle that you purchased. No other trash, please.

It was a paved narrow road that led us to the tunnel where we would have to decide which way to go. When we arrived to the tunnel it was pouring rain and gusty. We ducked into the tunnel and put on another layer. It seemed like the weather might clear some and if we were walking in the woods, we would get some protection from the wind. The hike to the mountain was our decision. We hope it was the right one. There are some scattered signs indicating this is the path, but at times we weren’t sure we were on the correct one.. There were numerous logging roads to make it confusing, but we pulled out the Henro App and felt confident that we were going in the right direction. As we got closer to the top, the rain stopped and the view opened up. There was a rest hut here as well as benches to sit on.

The rest hut. There were signs indicating that the trail down was used for a race.and we figured that it would be well marked. Here is a view from the top.

We were glad we took this route and the rain even stopped by the time we got to the top.

This is a screen shot of the map we were using. One can see all of the roads that are in the area.

As we headed down the trail we came out to a road, and thought it made sense to keep doing down hill, that was a mistake as eventually we realized we were not going in the right direction. Reversing our direction we headed back up the hill till we came to the intersection of the trail and went the opposite direction. Always hard to go back up hill and regain the elevation that you lost. We felt better about our new direction and hoped that we would get to the last temple before it closes. Then we saw a sign that pointed to an observatory. That usually means it was a good view, plus after the observatory the road was paved which meant faster walking. We figured it was with worth taking a look and once there we weren’t disappointed.

It was another good view. Then come the road walking which seemed to go on and on. The road did a lot of switch backing as we headed down. One could see where we wanted to go, but we were adding distance when we went back and forth down the mountain. Eventually we did make it down and headed towards the last temple of the day.

Temples that haven’t burned down seem so much older than the ones that have been rebuilt. This one just felt old. The large sandals here gave us pause when we think of all the pilgrims that walked this trail many years ago.

It is difficult to even imagine walking this trail in straw sandals. Our shoes have thick soles plus a padded insole. We are each carrying an extra pair and in a 100 miles or so we will use the second pair. Below are scenes from this temple. the blossoms are continuing to come out.

With the rain pouring we start looking for our hotel. We find it, but not the entrance. We walk completely around the hotel before seeing the door. The clerk uses a translator to communicate with us. They are amazing to imagine how they work. At this hotel they didn’t have any double room, so Don and I have single rooms next to each other. After settling in and taking baths, we head down to the dining room and like the French couple told us, have a great buffet feast. We do our laundry, which is nice because our clothes got pretty wet today so now we will have clean dry clothes. Heading back to our room we say goodnight at our respective doors. Tomorrow we are dedicating the morning to filing an extension for our taxes, It will be one of the first mornings since we started we aren’t packing up to leave by 6.

Accommodation Uwa Hotel

Miles Hiked 22

Eitokyji Bekkau (8) road walking

March 24

The rain continued all night and was pouring as we looked out the window this morning. Don was working on taxes and after some frustrating moments, happy to say that we have an extension. We headed down to breakfast and had another delicious buffet with a good variety of food. We each took a small bowl of rice and were determined to use our chopsticks to get the last grain of rice out of the bowl. The table next to us was filled with Japanese people that were getting quite the kick out of watching us use chopsticks. I think they would have given us a standing ovation when the last grain of rice was taken out of the bowl. Around 9:30 we couldn’t delay our departure any longer. So with full rain gear and umbrellas up we headed out into the elements, trying to avoid the many streams flowing down the sidewalks and streets. Today is going to be pavement only walking so we are prepared to getting splashed.

High above the town is Ozu Castle. With the rain still pouring we decided to walk on and just look at it from afar. We also took note of the colorful man cover. Don has now started an album of man covers and is getting quite a few of them

We passed a group of boats that we weren’t sure if they were for tourists or if they were used for fishing.

It was mostly flat walking today so by early afternoon we had arrived to our hotel. We were relieved when they told us we could check in. We washed our socks that were quite filthy from all the rain and the puddles that we had walked thru. The rain has finally slowed down and is mainly just a slight drizzle. We headed down to Eitokuji Temple which is one of the 20 Bekkau temples. This temple was destroyed in 2018 and in 2020 was started to be rebuilt.

This is definitely one of the most modern temples we have visited. One of the notable things about this temple is it is located near a bridge that Kobo Daishi slept under during his travels. Over 1000 years when Kobo Daishi visited this area there was no lodging for the night so he slept under a nearby earthen bridge. Near the temple there is a statue of Kobo Daishi sleeping under the bridge.

There is a bridge that you can walk across and then walk down a flight of stairs to where Kobo Daishi laid. Even the bridge has Kobo Daishi on it.

Down under the bridge are several memorials to Kobo Daishi. One statue is even covered with warm blankets.

One thing that we have read about and actually do is not to use our trekking poles or staff when we cross a bridge. One may waken a sleeping Kobo Daishi.

It hasn’t been a long hiking day, but it has been a very wet one. Time to go check out some restaurants. The first one we look at is a sushi restaurant. It is busy and we are not sure we understand the process of how to order the food. It seems to be totally automated. Not ready for the challenge we head to a restaurant called Joyful. This is a chain restaurant as we have noticed them in other towns. The menu is colorful with lots of pictures. It is easy to point and order. Pizza and steak dinner were our choices. Followed by an ice cream Sundae. We were treated well and enjoyed eating here. Back to our hotel to plan the next couple of days. Our hotel is called Super and when we see that we have a choice of pillows to take to our room, we can see how it got its reputation.

Accommodation Super Hotel

Miles hiked 12

No Temples, Mostly road walking

March 25

The Super Hotel was just super. The clerks were helpful and everything was very clean. Renee and the couple from France were staying there as well. We had a great buffet breakfast with lots of good choices. Shared our table with Renee and got caught up with some of her experiences.

It was hard not to go back for seconds!

The morning was a bit misty, but the hard rain of yesterday seemed to have passed. We passed a park that had public bathrooms. We had never seen a flush toilet for small children. It is such a great idea.

Plus it also had a hand rail!

Todays walk took us through areas of Spring is in the air.

Loved the daffodils

We passed by small memorials.

and more signs of the coming cherry blossom season. There are news alerts sent out predicting when the peak of the cherry blossoms will be in the different areas.

We are getting excited about seeing the blossoms.

We started following a beautiful stream that took us all the way to where we are going to spend the night.

A small rest area had numerous nameslips attached to the walls. They would be put there by pilgrims who were thankful for the hut.

The cherry blossoms were a contrast to the teal water in the river.

We bought some oranges and carrots at a small fruit stand along the way. Paying for the fruit is the honor system where you just put money in a box. We also stoped at a Family Mart and bought food for tonight and breakfast tomorrow.

Benjamin from France who we met again was quite helpful in marking our guide book of huts that were okay to stay for the night. The hut that we plan to stop tonight is one that he marked. It fit the rules. Bathroom, and no houses near by.

We arrived around 3 which is somewhat early for us to stop, but in the big picture this place is a good option. After we had left the hotel, we saw no other Pilgrims hiking today nor did any one pass the hut that we planned to spend the night. The temperature was dropping and rain looked imminent. By 4 :00 it was a down pour. When the wind started blowing, we knew that we needed to put up our tent fly to keep some of the rain out. We used it as a tarp attaching the four corners to the back of the hut, It worked and we found an area on the floor to spread out our bags for the night. Some of the rest huts have dirt floors, but some like this one have concrete.

Can't tell from the photo, but the rain is dumping. In most places we have been, we have had good cell service which helps with our logistic planning.

Accommodation Rest Hut

Miles hiked 16

Daihoji(44) more walking

March 26

By morning, the rain had let up some. We were on the route by 6:15 and heading toward the town of Kuma. Last night when we were looking for confirmation of our lodging, we couldn’t find it. When we had booked it, we thought everything had gone thru and we would just be waiting for the address from the host. The booking was done thru Air B&B. We are hoping that it may still show up today. We decided that our first priority is to visit Temple 44 and worry about our lodging later. The trail is going to be a combination of trail hiking mixed with pavement. One warning that we have read about today’s hike is that you do not want to get caught in the woods. You should make it at least to the town of Kuma. Our hopefully reservation is past Kuma which means we need to have a steady pace today. The cherry blossoms are becoming more and more evident.

Not sure the name of this tree , but we had to stop to admire it.

As we headed off the road and into the woods. we understood better about the warning of getting thru this section during the day. It was somewhat eerie walking in the overcast weather.

Don finds his way.

We passed thru an area that had logs placed in a certain formation.

After thinking about it, we came up with the idea that these logs were being used for mushroom growing.

At a rest area, we meet Lisa from German. She is the fourth single woman that we have met. We always enjoy talking with them. She is headed to Temple 44 today as well and has lodging in Kuma.

At one point the trail was on an old road that didn’t seem to be used much.

The trail was soggy from all the rain that fell last night. We were glad that we had our umbrellas.

By noon, we had arrived to town and were headed to a convenience store, when we were stopped by a man on the street who asked us where we were going. When we told him he asked “why” We Said to buy some food and then he pointed behind us and said you should go there. It is a very nice grocery store. We turned around and agreed this is a very nice store, plus it had a bakery. The bakery also had food that you could order and eat at the counter. We each got a burger and a drink. We searched the store for some food items for tonight and tomorrow. Once we leave Kuma, we won’t find any stores for a couple of days. Tomorrow is exploring temple 45 which is an in and out route. We had planned to stay at our lodging for two days so we could hike to temple 45 without our back packs. We haven’t gotten a response so we will have to come up with a plan after Temple 44 The town of Kuma was in a festive mood. The streets were lined with artificial cherry blossoms and Japanese dolls.

The streets make us smile.

We found a new hairstyle for Don

It was a lot of fun to walk the streets before going to Temple 44. Temple 44 is not far from the town, but as usual there are plenty of stairs to reach it.

This is known as the Temple of Great Treasure. Hanging on both sides of the gate are huge straw sandals.

We can only imagine the work that went into making these.

There were more stairs going up to the main Hall.

This temple stands in a forest of cypress trees.

The figure with the blue cap is often seen in front of the halls. Usually there is a sign on it telling you if it is the main hall or the Daishido hall.

With the cloudy day it gave the temple a solemn feel especially with the large trees surrounding it. Still no word about our lodging tonight so we decided that we were just going to head up in the direction we think it is located and hope for the best. We know that it is near the observatory and that is in one of our guides. We head away from Kuma with several days of food and begin a climb up to the observatory and hopefully either a place to put up our tent or better yet would be the place we reserved. It is an up but it is on a paved road which makes for somewhat easier walking. As we near the top we see a welcome to pilgrims to come in and have a cup of coffee or tea. This looks promising . There is a brown building that we go to check out.

There is a man and women in the building and they welcome us in. We explain that we thought that we had booked a couple nights here, but never got a response. He looks thru his reservation book and there is no record of us. He said no worries, I have a place for you! Meanwhile they have made us tea and coffee plus some good tasting cookies. He explains that sometimes there is problem with the reservation system and since no one is staying here we can have lodging for two night. Wow, this is better that we could have imagined. The have sweet potatoes cooking on the wood stove wrapped in tin foil and give us each one. It melts in our mouth! After eating we head over to what is essentially a small house, There is a kitchen, a bedroom, a hot bath for us to take, bathroom and a dining room. We are blessed! Our host show us around and recommends that we use the heat tonight. It is going to be cold.

This is the view we saw from the observatory which is located right next to the brown building. The name of this location is Sea Above the Clouds. It may be obvious how it got that name tomorrow.

Accommodation Sea Above the Clouds

Miles Hiked 16

Iwayaji(45) Slack packing

March 27

Yesterday had been a long day and basically after we ate some dinner we head to bed and 10 hours later we wake up. It was warm and cozy in our Japanese style house. Our hosts invited us over for tea before we left to visit Iwayaji. We got a better look at the observatory and learned that it was built by our host.

A lot of mornings, clouds cover the valley below as well as the mountains making it look like a sea of clouds, hence the name Sea of Clouds for the lodging. This is not the case this morning as the sun is shining brightly and the sky clear blue. Sorry not to see the clouds, but really happy that we are going to visit temple 45 on a clear and beautiful day.

Looking at the town of Kuma below us. Previously we mentioned about the alerts from speakers going off 3 times a day. Inside our hosts house was a speaker that broadcasted theses alerts as well. Definitely a way to keep up on current events.

Inside the office, before we left to visit the temple.

Our host before leaving for the day.

We headed down the pathway, glad that we were not carrying our packs.

It looks like it will be about 14 miles round trip today. There are two ways to approach this temple, one is to come from the top going over a mountain to reach it, The other way is to to walk via the road and arrive to the temple at the parking lot and then use lots of steps to make your way up to the temple grounds. We thought that we would do both ways. Take the road first and then go back to our lodging by the mountain trail. We came down a trail from our lodging and intersected the highway. It was a pavement walk that after awhile, made us wonder if we had made the right choice. There was a lot of downhill and one always thinks, what goes down must go up. We wondered how far we were going to have to go up. On a positive note, we stopped to get some drinks at a vending machine and purchased the best white grape drink that we had tasted. Eventaully we saw a sign that made us realize we were close. There are certain temples on this route that gets rated as more impressive, both due to the location as well as the Temple grounds. Temple 45 is one of them. We were glad that we had dedicated most of a day to explore the temple. After walking into the parking lot we noticed a lot of vendors selling souvenirs. This is not common at most of the temples. There was a sign pointing us to the temple going up stairs and then more stairs.

There were colorful banners on both sides of the path.

On the way up we passed a lot of memorials including this one.

When we reached to where some of the Halls are located, we noticed all the people. Most had driven here.

Some of the halls are built right into the rocks.

It has been said that a lot of the caves behind thee buildings were where monks would sit and meditate.

There was a ladder that one could climb to one of these caves. I climbed up to check it out.

This was the view from the cave. A peaceful place to meditate.

We had several interesting encounters with people that we met here. One woman approached us and wanted to know how old we were. She was 73 as well, but had driven here. She was impressed that we had walked here. She wanted to give me a mala. which are prayer beads. When meditating at the temple you hold them between your hands.

Here is the photo of the woman that gave me the Mala..

While I was looking at some of the memorials, a woman approached Don and wanted to take his photo in different poses. She would tell him where to stand or kneel and how to hold his hands. She wanted to make sure that he had good memories of this place.

She had him stand in several places and then kneel. Don then took a photo of her. Her husband then gave us a package of candy as ossetai.

We meet Lisa from Germany again who was so happy that the rain has stopped. Renee was here as well and then we saw Jean_Pierre coming thru the gate after coming down from the Mountain. We told him that he looked like an angel in his white clothing.

Jean-Pierre Louis. Anne had decided to take the day off so he was by himself;

We spent more time looking at the buildings and all of the memorials.

We are always amazed at the fine details of the wood working on the structures. Renee told us that we should definitely hike back up the mountain and check all the 36 statues of Buddha along the way.

Heading up the mountain

Looking back down at the gate. The trail goes up and down at the beginning as it passes the Buddha statues

This route was going to be slower than the road, but it was so more peaceful and beautiful .We met Benjamin from France, who wanted to share more places we could camp. A couple of other groups also passed us wanting to know how much further they had to go. This route is known as Nansho which means difficult. The trail lived up to the name. It was great knowing we had a nice place to stay tonight. The advise of spending time visiting this temple was great.

We made it back to Sea of Clouds and were greeted by the hosts. He showed us one of the bee hives that he was working on. From the size of the hive, it had to be successful at making honey.

We also checked out a small memorial that he had made on his property. He had built a wooden walkway up to it.

They invited us in to have another cup of tea with them and some Japanese crackers. Since they knew we were planning on leaving early in the morning, we decided taking a photo of all of us now would be best.

What a great day of making memories and continuing to learn about the Japanese culture.

Accommodation Sea of Clouds

Slack Packing 14 miles