Day 7: 88 Temples (20,21) - Aratanocho

Our host at Momijinosato Minshuku is a very nice lady.  The two meals were both excellent and the house is very nice.  At breakfast she presented us with a lunch of rice balls, hard boiled egg and tangerine.  This saw us through the day.

We started with about 2km beside a busy road with school children on the other side of the street.  When we turned off the busy road we started climbing.  The rest of the day was mostly on trails or very quiet roads.  One 3km section was had a few fast cars in the last quarter.

As we climbed the views became quite amazing.  Soon we were in forest and climbing stairs.  The climb was nearly 500m in only 3km.  It was very steep the whole way.  After about 2 hours we reached Temple 20.

After Temple 20 we descended as far a we had come up.  Mike is faster on the steep uphill, we are about the same on the less steep uphill, we are both pretty slow on the steep downhill, but I'm a lot faster on the less steep downhill.

We crossed a big river and started climbing again.  Temple 21 was slightly higher than 20 but only about half is as steep.  We finally came to the end of the steep stairs and thought we were there.  There was a short steep section but we could see a temple gate.  We were there.  No, still a few hundred meters of insanely steep stuff.  Finally, we came to a level area and took of our packs in front of the temple office where you get your book stamped.  Still two long flights if stairs to the main temple.

Temple 21 is quite a fancy temple.  There were lots of people milling around.  Most had come up by the ropeway from a car park at the river below.

We saw a few people we've run into a few times and said hello.

We then descended as much as we'd climbed, again.  At the bottom there was a closed cafe.  It made me want a coffee and fortunately there was a vending machine.  We then had a few kilometers on a road.  Not much traffic but wat there was came through pretty fast.  The road narrowed and suddenly large trucks started passing.  Mike made a crack about us being on the quarry road.  Later on the next climb looking back were could see that was correct.  The hillside had a large scar.

Soon we were off the road and onto concrete access paths.  These are just wide enough for a well driven car.  I would love to know how many end up falling off these roads.  We were back to climbing but this one was a lot shorter, steep though.  We again descended and as the road flattened out in the valley we were nearly at our destination.

Pandaya Minshuku is a homey place and it is quite full tonight.  We have seen and killed a few very big mosquitos in our room.  The owner was very excited because he had a Canadian staying and 40 years ago he had work in Quebec for some period as a crab tester for his company.  Most of the people here we have seen on the trail.  Everyone from temple 21 is here.  There were two tables at dinner.  Ours was the foreigner table.  We sat with a couple from Hong Kong.  One girl at the other table is Brazilian of Japanese descent and speaks Japanese.  Our friend from the road yesterday and day 2 and temple 21 is also here.