Above and Beyond
After passing the halfway point of the pilgrimage, I unfortunately experienced a bit of a dip, both mentally and physically. A message from home pulled me out of my positive mood, and to make matters worse, I caught a pretty bad cold. But nothing that a short quarantine and the amazing omotenashi of the Shikoku-jin couldn’t fix.
The cold was under control after locking myself up for a full day, taking some medicine, and consuming a whole bunch of vitamins. With encouraging words from family and friends, I was able to put my mind at ease and focus on the here and now. There is no use in lingering on things that are literally 10,000 km away and out of my control. So I continued with what I came here to do—and what has been so helpful this past year: walk!
On April 5th, I armed myself with a family pack of tissues and some awful nasal spray, and hiked along the west coast for two days until I reached Uwajima, where I stayed for two nights. From there, I took the train to the bigger city of Matsuyama to do some shopping. I was in desperate need of a new pair of shoes, as the tread on my New Balance had completely worn away. As the weather was beautiful, it also turned out to be a great day for sightseeing—enjoying the sakura blossoms, which were in full bloom around Matsuyama Castle and the surrounding parks.
On April 8th, I continued the pilgrimage and visited both Ryoku-ji (41) and Butsumoku-ji (42), ending in Seiyo, where I visited Meiseki-ji (43) the following day. The next few days were spent hiking up into the mountainous Kumakogen area, which I reached on April 11th. While much of the path followed Route 56 and 380, there was quite a bit of elevation gain—but with my newly acquired shoes, it was very manageable.
On Sunday, April 12th, I visited both Daihō-ji (44) and Iwaya-ji (45). The latter, built right against the rock face of the mountain, required another steep climb. And with that, I have now visited over half of the temples and have walked about 750 kilometers on the pilgrimage. In reality, I have walked well over 1,000 kilometers already, including all the additional back and forth to minshuku, hotels, convenience stores, and so on.
At the beginning of this post, I mentioned omotenashi, and I would like to take a moment to express my gratitude for the immense hospitality I have received from the people of Shikoku. Not only for the incredible friendliness they show and all the ossetai I have been given, but also for the way people go above and beyond to make me feel at home. From the amazing meals I have been served, to the small lunches prepared for me to take along, to text messages days later checking if I am doing okay—it is truly a wonderful experience to witness such a selfless and caring community.
🙏🏻 どうもありがとうございま 🙏🏻
