3 April 2025 - Day 32 - Towards Temple 44 part 2 - 23 km

The Business Hotel Ozu Plaza had a free breakfast buffet, so after a cold dinner from the conbini yesterday I was looking forward to a Japanese breakfast. Unfortunately the buffet was very limited and as I don’t eat raw eggs on hot rice anymore (digestive problems ensued the two times I did eat them), I basically ate rice.

Josée and I had an appointment with Kukai sleeping under the bridge at Bekkaku Toyogahashi so that’s where we met around 8:30. This Bekkaku is unfortunately situated on a very busy street, but it does include the bridge under which Kukai once spent a long cold night and there is a worshipping place under the (modern) bridge.

We then continued our rather nice walk towards Uchiko, a nice small town close to the mountains. The sun was out, the temperature was perfect for walking and we both needed to stop every few minutes to enjoy the scenery and take pictures. Still, we arrived in Uchiko shortly after lunchtime and this was already Josée’s destination for today.

Since I hadn’t eaten anything serious and wasn’t going to get a serious dinner either I suggested we have ourselves a good lunch before separating. Amongst the many possibilities we chose a Soba restaurant and entered. It was a pretty, traditional Japanese restaurant with tatami mats on the floor and low tables where you need to sit on the floor. But first you need to take off your shoes.

We both ordered soba with tempura and when the dishes arrived, they were both decorated with a litte pot of fresh flowers. I just love this kind of attention they put in such small details. Before we left, the lady offered us both a small origami crane that moves its wings when you pull gently on one side.

I then needed to let go of my dear company, Josée went back to her hotel and I had some more kilometers to walk. Only: how far will it be? My Inn is nowhere to be found on the Henro Helper App or any other electronic map. The only place I know it exists is in the Shikoku Route Guide, Map 63.

But before worrying too much I needed to buy some food for tonight and tomorrow morning, which I did at my favourite small conbini. According to said Guide it looked like I had another 5-6 km to cover and I started getting nervous when I was approaching 8-9 km. I kept checking on all my maps and started asking people working in their garden. Luckily they all pointed me in the direction I was going, so at least I hadn’t missed it yet.

And then, finally, another village came in sight after another small tunnel. This looked right, but I still needed the help of 3 more people to find the place. The kind man then walked me from his office to the house and showed me around. I really have a whole house all to myself for this night! It’s huge, clean and warm. Perfect!

Tomorrow should really be a very short stage before the hard mountain stage on Saturday. But that’s another story. Thanks for reading, thanks for your comments.