Day 17: over one third


Morale is going back up again. And it couldn’t be otherwise after a challenging, yet successful, day of walking.

I had to face two climbs in order to access a small plateau, around 250 metres above sea level. Moreover, I completed more than 430 Km of the pilgrimage route, which means more than one third of the total mileage.

One of the best henro huts I’ve seen so far, with beds, couch and a lot of other stuff.

The pace is good, though I did have some cuts here and there in the past days. Still, I haven’t avoided any of the though parts. What I skipped were mainly parts of the o-henro route that go alongside big and boring roads.

I hate stairs.

Half-way through the morning, it began to rain. It wasn’t heavy rain, but it was still annoying.

The humidity was close to being unbearable. Sometimes the heat of my body steamed up my glasses.

It was nice, however, to walk in the forest again. 

Walking through some low clouds. Luckily the tree didn’t fall while I was going by.

At some point I saw several big warning signs in Japanese. They were full of Kanji so there was no hope of translating them into English. I’m sure it’s fine. What can possibly go wrong?

For lunch, I took a short detour to visit a ramen restaurant that looked interesting from afar. I lost a lot of time there, but the food was good. No regrets.

Rice fields are everywhere, in the countryside.

Today’s reward was Iwamotoji, the 37th temple of what I’m starting to call the “Crazy 88”, after Tarantino’s movie Kill Bill.

Tomorrow I will try to walk for another 30 Km, give or take, and reach the coast again. There will be a rather steep descent from the plateau, but nothing too worrisome.

The fight against mosquitoes goes on, with heavy casualties on both sides.

Why does everything need to be cute here?

I also made a couple of live videos today, where I mentioned my Patreon page. Check it out if you like, and thank you for having followed me so far!

I do need your support here, and it feels great to see that many of you keep up with my content every day. 

It’s super-encouraging. You’re the best!