Ohenro Day 26

I had a leisurely start to the day checking out about 9am. The plan was to cover about 24kms and get to the Tachibana ryokan where I was spending the night about 3:30pm. The town where I was, Uchiko is known for its Kyoto-esque streets with Edo period buildings. I had intended to take a bit of a detour and have a look especially at the old theatre building, but my leg was giving me grief and I didn’t want to add an excess kilometers to my day so I headed straight out of town after purchasing some lunch at a convenience store as there wasn’t much in the way of food options along today’s path.

It wasn’t long before I ran into Nobu-san who was a 3x reverse henro. He reminded me that doing the pilgrimage in reverse in a leap year gives you 3 x good luck so he was super happy about being able to do it this year (2020).We had a good chat about the pilgrimage and he asked if I’d done the Camino De Santiago. I think that seems to be the standard question to ask foreigners doing Ohenro. Funnily enough he said that it’s much easier than Ohenro.

Again there was a detour I had to take from the normal path. I’m not sure if it was due to the typhoon or just general road work but it sent out to walk along a highway (which is one of my least favourite types of roads to walk along.)

The road wasn’t too bad though and there was a footpath, which was a bonus.

And along the side of the road was quite a nice river with lots of colourful carp swimming in it.

Around 11:30am I stopped at a roadside rest hut which also functions as a bus stop to eat lunch.

In was in a little village – just a collection of a few houses hugging the side of the road but there was an elementary school that had its toilets open for henro so I stopped and made use of the facilities. The inside walls of the hut had quite a few ofuda from other henro as well as a framed scroll which carries all the stamps of the 88 temples.

There is quite a big business operating where you can buy these scrolls or stamp books that have been stamped without having done the pilgrimage yourself. I understand that not everyone can manage to do the walk (or have the time and money to drive it or take a tour), but I have mixed feelings on whether it’s a good thing or not.

I added my ofuda to the wall and had a look at some of the other ones there. This one from a “retired teacher from America” 68 years who visited in 2019 caught my eye. That fact that it’s red means they have done the pilgrimage at least 7 times before.

After lunch I continued walking along, marvelling at the steep slopes on the side of the road covered in the ubiquitous citrus trees of Shikoku. It’s hard to tell in the photo, but tending to these trees would take some serious physical effort. Considering most people in the agriculture industry in Shikoku are over the age of 70, it’s an impressive feat.

I also passed another ohenro hut meant for people to sleep in on the way.

Considering that this is the inside

And this is the shower

And this is the toilet

I was glad I had somewhere else to stay for the night.

I was 19.7km from the next temple and 47.5km from the previous temple at this point.

My accommodation options for the evening were exceptionally limited and it was basically Tachibana Ryokan or Ebisuya Ryokan. Both of them being a room in someone’s house meaning awkwardness level 100%. I always try and go for a hotel or something that doesn’t involve sharing a bathroom at least but for this I had no choice.

I’d actually made better time that I was expecting and needed to kill a bit of time at another rest hut so I wouldn’t arrive too early. It had started to rain and I wanted to get inside out of the cold and rest my leg, but people can get a bit touchy if you turn up to early to their house.

As expected, I was still a bit early and spent 10 minutes yelling “Gomen kudasai” at the entrance to the house (which is what you say to attract attention at someone’s house) before the husband shuffled out of the back room and got very flustered by the fact that I was a foreigner.

The house was eclectic as expected as these were just some of the interior design features

But the room was clean and I was the only one staying so it wasn’t too bad. I pumped up the aircon and helped myself to a cup of green tea and a green tea manjuu.

Of course the bath and toilet are shared but seeing as I was the only person staying, it was ok. The bath was of course just like in someone’s house.

And the toilet…well..

Dinner and breakfast were excellent though and much more than I was expecting. I was so stuff after eating all this delicious goodness.

And there was only a little bit of awkward conversation with the elderly couple who ran the ryokan but fortunately they mostly left me mostly to my own devices. There was even a crab gratin!

One thing I couldn’t work out though was the toothpaste. Normally everywhere you stay in Japan you are given a toothbrush and a little tube of toothpaste. And while I’d found the massive supply of toothbrushes on the sink, I couldn’t for the life of me find the toothpaste.

I was like, “Why are there so many brushes but no toothpaste???” Anyway, turns out that the toothbrush bristles have something on them that turns into toothpaste when you add water. So self-pasting brushes! In all my years of Japan travelling I have never come across them so apparently there are still things for me to experience in Japan.　Apparently you can even buy them at the 100 yen shop too – who knew?!

After dinner I had a chat with M from the comfort of my warm futon, watched some tv and went to sleep.