Day 2: where we travel with the rain

Monday morning, it means the roads will be crowded by vehicles more than yesterday, and also that we will share the road with packs of students heading to school.
That's indeed the case as long as we ride in Takamatsu, heading to the starting point of the ropeway which will take up to temple 85.

Most of the students seem surprised to see two gaijin, equipped with bright orange panniers, cycling on their same road. A group of them even greets us, probably thinking we are someone else: also the evening before, next to the hotel, some teenagers appeared amazed to see us and gave us good wishes for the match (???)

Reaching the starting station of the rope-way is a good warming up, and then we enjoy the climb on the side of a mist covered mountain.

Once we reach the top we see that the temple, and the few pilgrims being there early in the morning, is completely covered in clouds, the air is chilly but luckily it is not yet raining. A group of shopkeepers, not having customers to attend for, ask us about our trip, where do we come from and how are we liking the experience.

After chanting the sutras in the temple hall we start the descent, which proves to be challenging: the road is wet, the slope is at 21% and stretches one pin head after the other until the sea. The few cars we meet pay great attention in giving us space, and we manage to reach the bottom with just really hot rims.

When we reach temple 86 we are offered as o-settai a visit to the garden attached to the temple, which is indeed worth viewing. Its quiet appearance and the lack of crowd really inspires to sit down in meditation, but we cannot stop too long, as it starts to rain. Therefore we have to wear our rain jacket and proceed.

Temple 87 welcomes us with heavy rain, and all the henroes we meet are traveling either by bus or by car. Our glowing yellow jackets really make us stand out in the mass, and not only that.

For a while we take cover from the rain under the main gate, then decide to move on. We stop at a combini to evaluate what to do: the climb to temple 88 is pretty steep, and the wet road is not really inviting us to take the challenge.

A detour along road 10 would allow us a more quiet trip along the coast, with the inner sea at our left. We travel across a monotonous aggregate of house and small industrial areas under the continuous rain, until, after a short climb to a pass, the rain stops and we reach the sea.

The small islands scattered in front of us, partially covered in the mist and in the clouds, is really a magnificent view and boosts our energies for the remaining of the day.

Since the small coastal road seems to be more quiet and enjoyable than the busier road 10, we decide to continue on it as much as possible. At a certain point, where the only available road would go around a small cape, a signal of road work ahead makes us worry about having to travel back as it might be closed to traffic.

We take the risk of proceeding further, and after riding past an excavator, we have the leisure of an entire road just for the two of us. 

We have to make some climbing, but the rain dripping trees, the birds tweeting from the depth of the forest and the feeling of being the only humans in that stretch of land between the sea and the sky are more than enough for compensating the effort.

When we exit the cape we find ourselves in the fishermen village were we will spend the night. We head to the minshuku managed by a couple of elderly people. They cannot speak English, but have learned how to use a smartphone as instant translator, therefore enabling some basic conversation. They have also received for us our wireless router, which will help us having some internet connection along the trip.

The place is a small traditional house, with tatami and futon, next to the river bank. It doesn't look like it has been recently built, nevertheless the kindness of the owners and the feeling of a roof on our head after a day in the rain is refreshing and comforting. From the window of our room we see some herons catching their dinner in the shallow water, and this remember us we have to fetch our dinner, too.

We reach the local supermarket, buy some food (ramen, fruit and drinks) and, while the crickets play their songs for us, walk back to our lodging.

We don't have a reservation for tomorrow, yet, but we decide that we will take care of it tomorrow, once we understand how far we can get. Then the futon gives us a well deserved rest.

Where we stayed:

Minshuku Shiokaze, 0879 33 5567, Higashi-kagawa city