Monday, 22 June 2009

• Ashizuri day

  aka hardest walk day

  aka self-portrait day

  aka best scenery day

  aka nicest hotel day

  aka craziest seafood day

  aka windiest day

  I started off the day with about 25km to the cape of Ashizuri where #38 is.  I got a good early start on the day.  I was on the road walking at 7am.  That is probably the earliest yet.  I really wanted to see this beach, so I hiked down this treacherous little path too (which I discovered later was NOT a pilgrimage path, as I had thought)

  

  I had a little adventure climbing over the rocks to get there, but it was so worth it. 

  

  my footprints and shadow

  

  aww!  What a gorgeous beach.  Surfers already in the water at 7:30!  I was loving life.

  

  hooray, I can use the timer on my camera

  

  Then, I realized, after walking that entire beach, that I would have to fjord the river to get back on course!  Wait a minute... this wasn't in the guidebook.  I was super cautious because I nearly got my entire shoe sucked into some quicksand, but I made it across.

  

  ha ha ha, I might have a sick sense of humor, but this is hilarious.  Caution, drop!  Never leave ha ha ha

  After that, I found myself on this trail that was really hard.  I had to climb over things and under things.  The trail seemed to disappear at one point and then later it turned into a creek!  Complete with slippery rocks and swarms of bugs.  I was practically running through the woods at the end swinging my arms like a mad woman swatting the bugs.  So.... ready to get out of the woods.

  

  Somehow, I managed to take a different route and ended up on the other side of the cape.  I didn't realize this until hours later, but it did strike me as odd that the ocean was suddenly on my other side...

  

  This tunnel was cool.  I couldn't see the ocean until I reached the other side, but I could feel the seaspray in the tunnel.  Did I mention it was ridiculously, loose-your-hat windy out today?

  

  sweat running down my walking stick.

  

  how helpful.  It could be that way... or on the other hand....it could be that way too.

  

  more walking

  

  almost there....

  

  Hooray for explanations in English so that I will actually take the time to read them.  I figured, what the heck, lets go see the cave.  Down the stairs and down the stairs.  I started grumbling to myself...oohhh this will be fun to climb back up.  This stupid cave better be....

   

  

  holy!  Its the coolest thing I have seen so far.  These pictures are not great representations.  It was awesome, awesome, awesome. 

  me, contemplating the cave and the ocean

  

  of course I took my pack off (and everything else for fear that it would blow away in the wind), went down to the rocks and climbed over close to the cave.  I took a video... have to figure out how to post that....note to self.  The cave made me deliriously happy.

  

  more super wavey and windy scenes from around the cape.  The wind was blowing so hard that it was difficult to even get a picture.  I had to take my hat off and hold it, otherwise it would have been long gone.

  

  

  The lighthouse and famous suicide spot.  Ah, the Japanese are so romantic about death....

  

  Saw the John Manjiro statue.  This excited me because I read a historic novel about the guy before.  Very interesting.

  

  And FINALLY I found the temple.  Because I had taken a different pilgrimage route than what I thought, well anyway, lets just say it took sometime to figure all that out.

     the temple was really cool... lots of statues and pagodas and large rocks in the grounds. 

  

  Kobo Daishi in the Daishi hall!  Not totally certain it is OK to take a picture of this, but no one was looking....

  

  A priest stamps and writes calligraphy in my stampbook.  He gave me a cute little cell phone strap with a pilgrim on it for a present too.

  After that, I had to try and figure out that I had come the opposite direction and where all the hotels where, try and make a reservation, field phone calls from Kyohei and his mom about whether or not she would come to visit me the next day, and deal with the ridiculous wind (which was getting really old)... so I did was justgotspaid usually does and just walked into the first hotel and stayed there.  ha!

  

  I saw internet in the lobby and decided this would be good.  I just wanted to have a private shower room again too...  I did not know what I was getting myself into.  Pilgrim tour buses started to roll in and all the hotel employees in the lobby went japanese-style customer service beserk.  Then I get to dinner (above).  Yes, this is for one person. 

  

  Sashimi.  Shrimp is NOT delicious raw.

  

  a plate of mixed seafood and veggie wonders garnished with maple leaves.

  

  I do not like food that looks back at me

  

  sorry: sideways shot.  Whats in the pot!?!

  

  a bunch of seafood cooked over little granite rocks.

  

  uhm, what!?!  So, yes, I ate this little squid.  The old lady who served me was watching me!  I had to do it!  Why are they always watching me eat?  Watching a foreigner eating raw things with chopsticks might be as entertaining to a japanese person as watching an elephant ride a unicycle.... anyway.  I felt like I was on some sort of reality TV show, but I did it!

  

  I would be OK with never eating crab again too.  The anatomy of a crab is terrifying.  I think I actually kind of squealed like a little girl when I had to touch it.  What!?  She was watching me... I had to do it.

  

  I learned that this hotel is really popular with tour groups.... they all have their own different meal planned out with the hotel too.  Very interesting.  Actually, the hotel was totally booked by tour groups today except for two rooms.  Lucky me.  They have on outdoor hot bath (rotenburo).  I really wanted to try it out, but didn't want to be around all the tour groups (too many old ladies gawking at my naked body= not fun).  I ran up there right after eating before all the busloads of people where done and got in the bath.  aahhh, there is something freeing about being naked outside when it is this windy. 

  

  View from the bath

  

  What I really, really hope is the first naked picture of me online

  

  Nice!  That was refreshing.  So, you see, I am alive and well.  Its already after 10 and I have a 6:30 breakfast.  I wonder what that will look like.  I will finish this later.

  All night the wind howled like I was in a hurricane.  The front desk man said that it is not usual... hhmmmm.  What's going on with the weather.  It was raining, but has thankfully stopped.

  What I've been stressing on lately is whether I am going to fast or too slow, living too luxuriously, etc etc.  So this hotel was a little over the top.  To my credit, I honestly didn't know it was going to be this nice... and that crab was really horrifying.  I don't know, I've been on the pilgrimage for a little over 2 weeks now, I am at about the 1/2 way point distance wise... which means I am keeping to my pace (I wanted to do it in about 35-40 days).  But then Kyohei is on the phone all trying to tell me that I'll never be able to finish all 88 at this pace and I met some other pilgrim that was at the same place as me, but had been doing it for 3 weeks...    I feel guilty and like I am missing out on something or I am lazy if I take a bus or train and selfish, too slow if I don't.  I feel like I am living too luxuriously when I stay in a nicer hotel, but get annoyed staying at this little (sometimes dingy) inns.  Where is the balance here? 

  I have to find someway of being satisfied with whatever happens in the course of the day.  Even with lots of planning ahead of time and map checking, I still cannot predict or control what will happen during the course of the day.  Things always come up: a hotel is full, I have accidentally taken a different route, it rains and I ride a train instead, someone gives me a ride, I see something interesting and take an extra 2 hours.  There is no accounting for these things.  I am very flexible, but I think my perfectionism is taking over.  I want to have the best experience/ get the most out of this that I can.  Can I be satisfied?

  Anyway, I'm on the road in t minus ten minutes.  I really want to email and facebook, but this computer is ridiculously slow and I've already managed to crash it twice. 

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