Day 80 - From Hachiman Mountain To Nakatsu And On To Kusami, The Kyushu 108 Temple Pilgrimage, Japan
Day 80 - From Hachiman Mountain To Nakatsu And On To Kusami, The Kyushu 108 Temple Pilgrimage, Japan
We woke up early this morning in order to enjoy an early morning soak in the private hot springs of the Ryokan.
Usually Jules prefers to sleep a bit later in the morning and he skips the morning soaks, but this morning I convinced him to come, because yesterday evening he had only soaked in the public Onsen.
It was very relaxing and enjoyable to soak alone in the bath, surrounded by rocks and stones.
After our soak, we packed our backpacks and went to have breakfast.
It was a very good breakfast, perhaps too indulgent for pilgrims like us.
Then we walked down the mountain to Nakatsu city.
Along the way, we saw gentle butterflies that looked just like dry leaves, except that suddenly they would begin to fly, and you could tell that they were butterflies.
Some were brown and some were golden, just like the fallen leaves they live among.
As we reached the outskirts of Nakatsu, we stopped to do our laundry in a shop that advertised a 30 minute wash and dry cycle.
We had stayed for a few nights in hotels that had no washers, and we did our wash by hand, so it was nice to get a load done while we rested our feet after a few hours of walking.
Our plan was to go to Kokura and check into our hotel for the night, and walk around the city to look at restaurants and food choices, because we will be staying in Kokura until we finish the pilgrimage, returning to Fukuoka for the last day before our flight leaving Japan.
But it was still early in the afternoon, and it looked like we could still visit one temple before taking a train to Kokura.
We bought some rice balls and fruit at the station, and took the train.
Instead of going to Kokura, we got off the train in the town of Kusami.
We walked along the Nuki river all the way to the temple.
We saw a few other people walk or run on the river walk, using it as a scenic place to exercise.
Temple #91, Kanzan Shuzen-in Shinkoji
(Nuki-san Shuzenin, Shinkoji)
The temple was founded in the year 1239 by Asho Shojin who went around the country looking for places to establish hermitages.
He felt that Mt. Kanzan, also known as Nukiyama, was a sacred mountain.
He established a small hermitage, which was the beginning of "Nukiyama Shinko-ji Temple".
The temple was burned down in the 1500’s in a battle for power and control by rival clans.
The victorious Ouchi clan revived the temple, and made it their prayer temple in the Buzen Prefecture.
Afterwards, it flourished for a few hundred years.
During the Edo period, the Ogasawara clan became the lords of Buzen prefecture, and Shinko-ji Temple became the prayer temple of the Ogasawara clan.
In 1866, the temple was burned again, this time by the soldiers of the Choshu clan.
The temple had only one remaining small hall that was used as a temporary main hall, and the remaining Buddha statues, including the Honzon Amida Nyorai, were placed in the small hall that stands here today.
Nobody was in the temple and we walked around looking for the red ink and stamps.
The main hall had an open window at the front,which we slid open and prayed through.
The box of stamps had a red ink pad that was almost completely dry.
It was time to go back to our hotel and offload our backpacks.
It has been such an improvement to walk without full backpacks for weeks now, but it is nicer still to walk without any backpacks.
In the next few days, while we finish walking the pilgrimage, we will return to our hotel in Kokura each night.
After checking into our hotel in the city, we went to have dinner.
We found a good Indian restaurant that offered a vegetarian set, and walked there.
They were not yet open so we sat in a newly opened cafe run by a group of women.
They had very good soy rose and matcha coffees.
They took a long time to brew each cup carefully, and the drinks came with homemade cookies that they had baked themselves.
The Indian dinner was very good too, but it got so cold at night by the time we finished eating that we had to run back to the hotel, just to keep warm.
In the next few days, freezing temperatures and rainy days are forecasted.
We are happy to be done soon, because walking in this weather is getting difficult….
With frozen hugs,
Tali
Stats: 28,648 steps
Today’s walk: 20 km
Kilometers walked to date: 1360 km
Temples visited:
Temple #91 Kanzan Shuzen-in Shinkoji
(Nuki-san Shuzenin, Shinkoji)
