October 25

October 25...we made it to temple 88!

The day started with an easy walk to temple 87, Nagaoji. It was 7 km on the flats from where we stayed, Ishiya Ryokan, but the trek to the last temple was a surprise, not in a good way. It was what nightmares are made of. The last day was not going to go away quietly. In fact it was going to turn into the worst climb of the entire trip. After temple #87 it was at first a gradual ascent on roads that just got steeper and narrower. The top portion of the last ascent wasn't even a trail, just a jumble of rocks that could have been called a cliff if it were any steeper. You literally had to scramble up on all fours. At one point I went ahead to explore the trail(?) to see if indeed it was a trail telling Emi not to move. “I'll be right back.” I scrambled up as fast as I could and damn if it wasn't the trail. I took off my pack and went back to get Emi. Putting on her pack we climbed the rocks, not looking right or left. The sight of the drop would not have helped. It was something that you had to do and not think of all that could go wrong. The last bit to the top was a makeshift scaffold to replace a washed out portion of the trail (probably from the typhoon that kept us off 4 years ago). With Kobodaishi watching over us we made it to the top. We had to go down for another 40 minutes or 1000 feet before we reached the last temple, Okuboji. What a waste to go up only to go down if you ask me, but who's asking me. When we finally got there, hallelujah!!!!, I was glad, sad, grateful that we had made it. There were many moments when I thought that we were not going to be able to complete the walk. So many times when our bodies cried out, “Stop already.” It was done by only thinking of one day at a time, the thought of the entire trip too daunting. With the idea of the trip being over I could have shed a tear or two but we didn't have the time. The day was not over. We still had to walk down for another 2 hours to our onsen lodgings. We didn't get there until 5:05pm. All in all it was about a 20 mile walk, mostly up and downs taking slightly less than 10 hours. One and a half musubi and half a anpan for lunch didn't help the situation. By the end of the day we were both very tired but surprisingly not as tired as some of our other days.