Shikoku – Page 2 – Matkoya's Blog

Errors

2012-06-132012-06-19Mat Koya

I think, I made a mistake. On Tuesday I bought a pair of new shoes. Nike – victory. My old shoes were just gone. Water was entering both shoes and even dirt started coming through one sole.
When I started this journey, I was very comfortable with my trekking shoes. A solid sole, protected with Gore Tex against water – breath active as the advertising says. They were well worn in and I didn’t worry at all about them. They accompanied me half around the world, to Germany, Dharamsala, Nassik, the Yukon and even New York. I really liked them, but nothing lasts forever.

The way down from Koyasan until Tosa finally wore them out. Water started entering through a whole in the sole and when I was in Susaki, the first little stone found it’s way inside. I was desperatly looking for a shop having shoes in my size, which is not so easy here. For trekking shoes I need 9.5, which is in Japan 27.5 or 28. Japanese usually have smaller feet. In Susaki I first went to a shop for working cloth. No shoes there, but a pair of new rainpants and some socks 🙂 in a shopping center at the other end of town, I found some. Finally! They had 3 pairs. Timberland, something like proudly made in the USA for 5man and a special offer for 9000¥. As I didn’t plan to buy new shoes and being desperate in the same time, I went for the Nikes, I even didn’t ask, if they have the 500bugs shoes in my size. As it turns out, they are all plastic, made in Vietnam and now my feet do get wet without having rainfall from the sky at all, blisters included. I’ll see, how long they will endure my big feet.
Same thing with the rain pants. Well, they nicely protect against rain from outside, they also produce extra water from inside. After some time I had a feeling like like I pissed in my pants – hilarious! They still protect well against mosquito bites though 😉
My lesson from that is double 🙂
First I missed to double check my gear before I started. Second, being desperate makes me inpatient. My disturbed mind and wet feet didn’t let me think clearly. Live, in this case walk goes on, shigata ga nai as Japanese say, it can’t be helped or better it is as it is right now and I keep on walking towards Kongōfukuji.

Tsuyo

2012-06-082012-06-15Mat Koya

After 2 beautiful days on the coast of Shikoku…
….tsuyo, the rainy season started today! Now I’m sitting in a little henro-hut and it’s getting dark quickly. Raindrops are dripping on the plastic roofs, frogs and cicadas are singing their songs. Sometimes are car is passing by interrupting their chorus.
Around are my cloth, hanged of the boards of the hut. Hopefully they get at least a little boy dry until tomorrow morning. At least the stuff in my backpack is dry 🙂 meanwhile I pack everything into separate plastic bags. In Japan you get everything packed, so having enough bags is not an issue. Wrapping Culture by Joy Hendrik is a known book about this Japanese phenomena. While making a present in Japan, the wrapping is quite often more important than the content.
Fruits are growing into their wrapping
This also makes brand wear – stuff from a well known maker, like Gucchi, so popular here. The name is just the wrapping, the quality is not so important.
Now I will wrap myself in my sleeping bag and dream my cloth dry 😉

Rain drops

2012-06-052012-06-05Mat Koya

…are falling on my head was the song of today instead of Deep Purple’s Stormbringer. The typhoon took a turn right out on the pacific ocean. No strong winds only rain, continuos rain, neither heavy nor dripping, just rain. My thoughts turned around that song, reminding me on the first kiss. It was the end of the year, party time. In Brixen in Tirol skiing. It was very romantic in the kitchen of a mountain hut, snow outside and that song playing on the radio. Do you remember your first kiss?
And I got wet from inside out as well as from outside in. Although equipped with a nice orange poncho and rain trousers, I was wet down to the bones. It started yesterday evening, when I was sitting in front of my tent, just after finishing my dinner, slowly the first drops were falling down, I grabbed everything and crawled into the the tent, listening to the raindrops. In the morning it was still raining, luckily there was a barn nearby. So I could pack things without everything getting totally wet. It continued all the way up to Kongōchōji until I finally took shelter in a place at Tano. It was a strange day. Around noon I ate ramen (noodle soup) at some place and got literally thrown out after, the shop is now closing, understood? Said the guy behind the tender. I also received a mail, that my google-adsense account was deactivated. I just wondered and moved on. Rain drops are falling on my head…
The day before the weather report was wrong, it was warm, if not to say hot. The night before I unintentionally spent in a fisherman’s house. I just wanted to eat something and ended up with drinking beer – the glass was filled from all sides again and again – and pushing arms in a pub. On the end I stayed in the room of that fisherman, who called me into the pub in the beginningp.
Yesterday I went up to Hotsumisakiji, the place where Kūkai did the morning star meditation, called Gumonjihō. Actually he didn’t do it exactly there but on a place called Mikuradō, a cave, with a nice view and prone to get rheuma there as it is drafty and quite wet. Well Kūkai was still young then, when his teacher Gōnzo taught him. It was probably on this place that he decided to change his name to Kū – Air and Kai – sea. I missed the place when I went up to Hotsumisakiji, so I went back and just made it still to Shinshōji I’m time 🙂

Kokuzo Raindrops are falling on our head …

Holidays over

2012-06-022012-06-05Mat Koya

Become like water is one of the famous sayings from Bruce Lee. Water is so powerful that it always finds it’s way in, at least into my shoes. In the late afternoon I passed by Meitokuji, a place known as zenconyado, where pilgrims can stay for free. The sky over the sea looked awfully black. But no one was there, so I moved on. A little bit later it started pouring from these black clouds like crazy. With the help of my nice orange poncho and some 200¥ rain trousers I somehow stayed dry besides my socks 😉
Anyway this lag although along the coast, goes all the way along a street with a lot of traffic.
Now mosquitos start literally eating me…after rain always comes sunshine, ne 🙂

The first long leg

2012-06-012012-06-02Mat Koya

Writing is a way to get things off ones mind. This one here is sitting on my mind way too long 😉
About Shoes and Beans
One can find in any story about Shikoku, going up to Kakurinji (#20) and Tairyūji (#21) is tough. It’s like walking 2 stairways up and down, each more than 1 km long.
At Tairyūji I met a young monk from Hiroshima, who was limping. He told me that he has mamme, meaning beans, the Japanese word for blisters and he was not the first guy, I saw limping around.
They all were wearing sneakers and thin socks, because it’s hot here and thick socks and big shoes obviously make you more sweat. OK, I sweat more – without beans 😉
One can take it always the hard way. With gettas, traditional Japanese wooden shoes, with 5-finger shoes, which I considered or the traditional white Japanese Henro shoes with a separate big toe, which will make the skin between the big and the second toe really sore.
The safest way are trekking shoes and a bit thicker socks. The shoes should go up to the ankles to protect them. Socks need to be thick enough to absorb the sweat well. I got one little blister until now. While crossing a creek on my way to Wakayama, I stepped into the water and continued walking with a wet sock. The result was a blister on the 4th toe. My shoes are with Goretex, so as long as the water is not deeper than the shoes are high, the feet stay dry. That creek was deeper 😉
I just should have taken one more pairs of socks with me – they really get smelly after a short while 😀
Sunny Boy
The first time I escaped a rain storm was 2 days ago, after coming down from Jigenji. I just went into a house. There were these curtains in front of the door and I thought it’s some kind of local pub. It looked like that inside. A counter, glasses, a box with canned beer and a grandma behind. I was wrong. No she said, I’m not selling anything. Then she offered me cup noodles, beer and some kind of boiled egg with vegetables. Later came a mountain farmer in, who told me about a camping ground not far away. Grandma rejected any money, I only felt grateful. When I was on the way to the camping ground the guy I just met before came after me and gave me some 3kgs of fruits.
Yesterday I again escaped a rainstorm. Just when it really started pouring, like crazy, I was standing in front of a cheap looking beach-hotel some 2 km away from Yakuōji. I couldn’t resist and went in. Dinner, hot ofuro and a washing machine, just wonderful. How such normal things can make me feel blessed all the sudden!
Yakuōji, btw is a wonderful place with a nice atmosphere, sea-view and across there’s a castle.
A bit too late I arrived today at Saba Daishi. I entered some area with shoes, searching for someone to “stamp me off”. On the first view, this was not a good idea. One monk saw me and got a bit angry, take your shoes off, damme, he shouted. On the end I was invited for the evening ceremony and I stay here now in a little hut for henros. There’s a special story about Kūkai and a fisherman on the horse. One can see a statue of Kūkai holding a saba, a macrele, in his hand.
And of course, the weather forecast for today was wrong. Instead of rain, sunshine and hot – a sweaty day and nice ofuro on the end 🙂
How life can be beautiful!

Saba Daishi

On the coast

2012-06-012012-06-01Mat Koya

Meanwhile I’m just 2 km away from Yakusōji, which is temple 23, on the coast. The route after will be pretty long, more than 75 km.
What’s it about?
Recently I’ve been thinking a lot, what to do with this blog here. Giving another more or less boring travel or better pilgrimage description, which anyway no one will read, besides some close friends and family? In the later case it would be probably better to write in German 😉
Some days ago I received an email from a dear friend and it hit me like a hammer. The question was, what’s the difference to pilgrimages in Bavaria and over there in Shikoku? Basically there is no difference, so why am I doing this?
I decided to write this blog on one side about this question – what do I want to get out of this? Where do I want to go from here. Obviously this will become some kind of personal growth story – hopefully 🙂
On the other side I will talk a bit about what happened and what I experience on this journey. Finding the answer to the question above is not only a dynamic process, it is directly connected with the experiences we make.

A Tip
After being at some of the temples, I think a good preparation for such a journey would be to find oneself a very long stairway and run it up and down for an hour. First without then with luggage on the back. Add a little more than you plan 😉
Just before going up to temple 20 I received some 3kgs of fruits as osettai. The weight diminished slowly. But the tough thing is to first walk up so many stairs with that package on ones back.

Big brother is watching you on [nearly] every gate

A-gyoUn-gyo

The First Steps

2012-05-232012-05-23Mat Koya

Easy walking from Ryōzenji towards Dainichji. I arrived there at 5:15 and the guy told me sorry, we’re closed and send me to some old cow stable – it’s save there, he said. But I didn’t like to sleep on the concrete floor, so I looked for some softer place, which I found near on the edge of the woods. During the night I could hear fears coming out and looking for food.
The next day I decided to go up to Taisanji – 大山寺. The plate I followed said 1.8km, but it meant 1.8km to the first rest place. On the end that were more than 5 or 6 km steep up and sometimes down through woods and mountain. It was very nice and interesting what for thoughts and associations are coming to ones mind, while following the path. On the end it was worth the effort. After climbing 108 steep stairs, a nice old looking temple awaited me.

大山寺
After i came down from there i just managed to come shortly before 5 o’clock to Jisōji 🙂
A bit later I met 2 funny guys in front of a Lawson shop, who are doing the Pilgramige reverse by bicycle. They got their blog here: http://temples88.blogspot.jp/?m=1

Interlude

2012-05-232012-05-23Mat Koya

A warm welcome at Ryōzenji by our old friend from Koyasan, Kinoshita San. She brought me to a wonderful onzen and later we enjoyed a nice dinner together. The next morning presented me the wonderful spectacle of a full sun eclipse.
Washing cloth and spending the night at a friendly guys house. All that filled my heart with gratefulness for these wonderful and nice people.

oishiii dinner 🙂

Prologue

2012-05-212012-05-21Mat Koya

On the second day I had to take it really slow. The last peace of way towards Jisoin were really hard. Steep downhill on a street is a burden especially for the knees. The price I had to pay the next day with knee pain, which slowed me down a lot until I decided to stop, realizing that I walked less than 15km. Nevertheless this was the right thing to do and the knee stopped hurting the next day.
That night the North Face tent proofed itself the first time. I stayed on the shore of Kinokawa river. Rain and thunderstorm was knocking and wrenching on the walls of the tent. Next morning the sun was smiling down from the sky and I moved on. In the evening I allowed myself the luxury of visiting an izakaya in Iwase, a place in the outskirts of Wakayama city. He was so kind to invite me stay in his house over night. I felt so blessed! Hot shower, a big futon and a solid breakfast – with beer instead of coffee! – the next morning.

my hosts in front of their shop
The next day I could still walk for some time along the river but at one point I had no chance than to use the street until I reached the ferry port. In the evening I finally reached Shikoku. From Tokushima ferry port until Ryōzen-Ji it’s still some 30km mostly along streets.

Ryōzen-Ji

First day

2012-05-17Mat Koya

Late starting is not a good idea. After I was done with packing, going to Okunoin, writing mails and saying good bye to dear Takeshi, it was already 2 in the early afternoon. I thought Koyasan – Kudoyama, that’s half am hour by car, won’t be to long. On the end I came into the night and lost the way on the last 2km. These last couple of kms are the toughest part. It goes down hill, very steep on a concrete road through plantings of peach trees and this is burden for the knees, so it slows one down.
Now I’d like a shower or hot ofuro, all what is available here is a toilet, at least I can wash myself 🙂
The tent I bought before (North Face Mica1) is really small, but sufficient and built up in a couple of minutes. The low wright of 1.6kg is also a big plus.
Anyway I still have the feeling of carrying to much weight around, I’ll see if there’s anything I can throw off the next days. The sleeping bag,although it,s down, is quite big and heavy. On the other side it feels very cozy and it’s still fresh during the night.