July 8; Day Five: Getting more lost, Temples 78 – 83
The weather: hot, hot, hot! I got lost again, two or, maybe, three times.
I met an older arukihenro again at temple 78, Goshoji. I offered him o-settai; it seemed to embarrass him a little, but he accepted. He treated me as his equal, something I did not always see in arukihenro.
There is a hierarchy amongst henro, with the walking pilgrim at the top – and perhaps rightfully so, as theirs is the most arduous and exacting circuit. And a lot of them can really cover ground. 
Temple 78, Goshoji.
I ate more today - maybe trying to gain energy? I feel as if I’m not going far enough every day, not trying hard enough.
I try to remind myself not to race, to slow down enough to meet more people. I need to remember to take their pictures! I seem to always forget this. But there are still the countervailing pressures of time and money...
Tennoji, temple 79.
Temple folk today seemed largely disengaged, but I had more interesting conversations with others, like the man above. Some older men and a truck driver helped me find my way when confused.
Temple 80, Kokobunji's main gate. 
Road sign between temple 80 and 81.
Ancient (and very twisted!) tree at Temple 81, Shiromineji.
Maneki-neko on a torii at Shiromineji.
Shiromineji's gate.
Ten foot high pagoda made with strangely colored small pieces of rock.
Main shrine at Shiromineji.My legs were a bit sore, and I walked the bike in the steeps for about four kilometres between temples 81 and 82.
Temple 82, Negoroji, and Godzilla's grandpa!
Negoroji's hongan.At the main shrine in Negoroji, there is a hidden temple reached by walking around a corridor inside the gate.
I rode down and right around the mountain to get from temple 82 to 83.
Temple 83, Ichinomiyaji. Ichinomiyaji is one of the big and beautifully kept up temples. I found another water sculpture, called suikinkutsu, near the priest's office. I made a short recording of it. Yes, I got the date wrong. It's not a great example of how these things sound, though, because the people at the temple were running water continuously with a hose onto and into the container. Perhaps they were cleaning it...
Anyway here is another recording I made in June, on Omishima, a large island in the Seto Sea north of Imabari.
This Suikinkutsu is a modern sculpture in a small park just opposite the entrance to the famous Oyamazumi-jinja shrine in Yomiura town.
Somewhere in one of the many small villages around Tadotsu, I found this nice little store.
Stayed tonight in a nice, small business hotel in downtown Takamatsu, near Ritsurin Park. I did not take the time to go into the park, though I probably should have…the Japanese gardens here are said to be exceptionally beautiful.
After I had my room key, I went back out to my bike, and leaning it up against the wall, locked, dirty, took off my gear and was preparing to take it inside when a sedan pulled in beside me, and the driver, a business man in his mid-sixties, got out, in seeming high dudgeon. Glancing at me in a look uncomfortably close to contempt, he muttered something in Japanese about bicycles and stormed inside. He looked like he might be the owner, but I didn’t see him again.
I discovered later that evening that I had left my spare shirt and shorts in the hotel room the night before. Mountains are tough.
