Shikoku Pilgrimage Stage 1, Japan

Tokushima Prefecture: Awakening the Spirit

Prologue

Our Shikoku Pilgrimage begins less than auspiciously. We asked the author of our guidebook if he knew of any reliable GPS tracks. His response is stern. A pilgrimage is not a hike but a path of ascetic training. There is such a thing as too much of a good thing; digital devices are unsuitable for the Shikoku pilgrimage. Getting lost is part of the journey. 

Chastened, we temper our planning for the pilgrimage but remain committed to following the footsteps of Kōbō Daishi to the 88 sacred Buddhist temples scattered around the island of Shikoku.

Kōbō Daishi (774-835) founded Shingon Buddhism in Japan. A saint in the minds of the Japanese, he was a Buddhist monk, administrator, poet and educator who established the first school in Japan to allow anyone to attend, regardless of their social status or economic means.

Visiting the 88 temples and paying homage to the great teacher is the most important aspect of the Shikoku Pilgrimage. So while almost 150,000 henros (pilgrims) undertake the pilgrimage each year, most do it by car, public transport or on a bus as part of a tour group. Only a thousand or so walk the 1,200-kilometre route around Shikoku Island. But no matter how they make their pilgrimage, most henros travel with the belief that Kōbō Daishi is with them on the journey.

The pilgrimage has four stages, with progress through each of Shikoku’s prefectures representing a stage of spiritual development. Tokushima represents the awakening of the spirit to the search for truth. Kōchi is the stage of aesthetic training. Ehime represents attaining enlightenment and Kagawa is the stage of entering nirvana.

As non-Buddhists living in this fractured time in history, the notion of us reaching nirvana is, at best, quixotic. But, if not nirvana, where will the pilgrimage lead us and what will we learn on this long walking journey into an unknown world? 

Day 1. 16 km Temples 1-6

Tokushima City spreads across the mountains and down to the delta where the Yoshino River enters the Seto Inland Sea. From here, we catch a train to Bando and walk to Ryōzenji (Temple 1), the start of our Shikoku Pilgrimage. The Japanese pilgrim we conversed with on the train takes a photo of us and shows us the way to the temple shop.

We buy two white vests and a conical sedge hat, traditional attire worn as a sign of respect and to identify as pilgrims. The white represents purity, innocence, and equality before Buddha. Inscribed on Michael’s hat is the name of Kōbō Daishi, written with a Sanskrit bonji character.

At Ryōzenji we practise the rituals of temple visits for the first time. We stand to the left, bow, purify ourselves with water and ring the bell once to announce our arrival. We light one candle and three incense sticks, place a name slip in the box and put our hands together in prayer. As we leave the temple, we turn around and bow again. It’s a lot to remember, although the Japanese don’t appear to perform all the rituals at every temple. The only strict rule is to be respectful.

We walk from temple to temple, weaving a path around small villages bordered by rice fields and gravestones. Climbing up through a bamboo forest, the murmur of water is a constant refrain. From a clearing, we look out to distant mountains and a winter-bare landscape. The sun is a balm after the near-freezing conditions of the last few days.

A woman working in her garden stops us and offers an osettai of three mandarins. Osettai is the act of giving gifts like food, drink, talismans, or other help to pilgrims. For the people of Shikoku, pilgrims are walking with Kōbō Daishi and could be his reincarnation. In offering osettai, they give to Kōbō Daishi and symbolically participate in the pilgrimage. This belief is epitomised in the farewell expression, jibun no bun made o-mairi kudasai (walk for me, too). For pilgrims, the only imperative is to accept the osettai graciously. To refuse is an insult.

Today we’ve visited six of the 88 sacred temples of the Shikoku Pilgrimage. These include one dedicated to the deity of Limitless Light and Life, one with an 800-year-old ginkgo tree (according to legend, the history of the temple is engraved on the tree), another with a cedar tree that has withstood wind and snow for over a thousand years, and one with a statue of the Bodhisattva Who Hears the Sounds of the World.

On our way to Anrakuji (Temple 6), a man cycling in the opposite direction stops, asks us where we’re going, and then turns his bicycle around and accompanies us to the temple. He’s curious about where we come from and our life circumstances. Do we have a son? No, we answer. Do we have a daughter? No. Neither does he. But we are fortunate in having each other, he says, while he’s alone in the world.

Temple 6 has a shukubo, a 400-year-old lodging facility with natural hot spring baths. We stay the night here in a tatami-matted room. Soaking in the hot onsen is bliss, dinner is an elaborate feast and the evening ceremony in the temple is our first awakening to the spirit of Japanese Buddhism. The ceremony requires three things: notifying the Buddha of our presence; praying for our ancestors by floating a candle on the river flowing through the temple; and wishing for a good life for others by writing on a thin piece of wood and placing it in a fire. The smoke takes our wishes up to the gods. A monk chants sutras, keeping the rhythm with wooden drum raps. The rituals are mesmerising. Leaving the temple, we pass several beautiful Buddha statues usually hidden from the public gaze. Matsumoto Myokei, a leading Buddhist sculptor, carved them. He believes that the Buddha’s soul is already alive in a tree and his job is to set it free. 

Day 2. 23 km Temples 7-11

After an onsen-induced deep sleep, we wander around the temple precinct, taking in its gardens in the soft early morning light. Today we’ll visit another five temples. This will allow us to practise what to do with the candles, incense and name cards we are carrying, especially as each temple has two halls and the same rituals are performed at each one; the main hall and the Daishi where a statue of Kōbō Daishi is enshrined. In recognition of our worship, a temple official (often a monk) marks our books with four stamps and hand-drawn calligraphy. Created with a traditional brush and precise strokes, the calligraphy specifies the temple name, number and principal image. As well as being a record of our visit, each page is an exquisite work of art.

As we walk, we hear strange music; the low-pitched, percussive rattling of bamboo swaying in the breeze. Once out of the forest, the walking is flat. We meander along back roads, beside canals and in and out of villages of abandoned buildings. The interiors of some of these shops and houses are as if the owners walked out one morning, taking nothing with them and never returning. Others are covered by vines and collapsing in on themselves. Alongside the abandoned houses are new houses, some built in traditional style and others the same squat boxes you find anywhere in the world. There are cows stabled in a barn in the middle of one village and farm machinery littering the only outdoor space. 

Kōbō Daishi named Temple 7 Komyōzan Jūrakuji (Temple of Ten Joys). He hoped that 10 bright lights and joys would shine upon people, despite life’s inevitable hardships. The path to Temple 8 is lined with blossom attracting a crowd of photographers. The temple complex itself is serene and surrounded by tall forests. Later, we climb the 333 steps to Temple 10 to find a river, mountains and a radiant, thousand-armed Buddha of Mercy.

There are no cafes open and we make do with hot coffee in a can from a vending machine. Later, we stop at a run-down shack full of fading Buddhist memorabilia. The proprietor is bemused by the presence of two non-Japanese-speaking pilgrims in his humble shop and at a loss to know what we want. Fortunately, another customer intercedes on our behalf and we secure a coffee and a roasted sweet potato.

The mountains are more defined today. The wind, biting. It howls all afternoon as we walk across a land of rice paddies and market gardens planted with spring onions, cabbages and daikon. We cross the river of birds that is the Yoshino, walk through the town of Kamiyama, desultory this grey afternoon, and into the foothills of the mountains. 

At Temple 11 there are two Japanese pilgrims chanting sutras but largely people pray in silence. The temple is one of three Zen Buddhist temples along the Shikoku Pilgrimage route, built by Kōbō Daishi to exorcise his misfortune and bring peace to all people. On a rock about 200 metres above the temple, he built a fire altar for Buddhist rituals and practised asceticism for 17 days. The temple’s name, Fujiidera (Wisteria Temple), comes from a legend that he planted five wisteria vines here. Below the main hall, these ancient wisterias still flower in five different colours during May each year. 

We spend the night at a nearby hostel with four other henros; two European and two Japanese, one of them a soba noodle maker. Our host, Masuda-san, is knowledgeable about the Shikoku pilgrimage and speaks English. He scribbles in our guidebook, noting the best places to stay and what not to miss en route. 

Day 3. 12 km Temple 12

The temple bell wakes us at 6 am. We’re pleased to be up early to start the 12-kilometre-long climb on an old pilgrim’s trail to Shosanji (Temple 12). Today’s walk is regarded as arduous, even dangerous. At 800 metres, Shosanji is the second-highest temple on the Shikoku Pilgrimage and the trail leading to it is rough and rocky with hundreds of stairs. It’s known as a henro korogashi, a pilgrim fall-down day. 

Although Shosanji has long been a place for ascetic practice, many pilgrims have their bags transported in this section. We carry ours, partly due to our habit of self-sufficiency and partly because the Shikoku Pilgrimage has several more mountain climbs and carrying our bags is good training for what is to come. 

Beautiful stone Buddhas and shrines line the steep path that winds around the mountain. It’s cool, but not bitterly cold. Before long the sun breaks through and the world is sweet with bird song. As we climb higher, the temperature drops and we notice snow lying on the ground. Soon, there’s snow falling and settling on the 800-year-old cedar trees. It’s a magical sight that transports us to a world of ancient deities, mystery and beauty; an illusion that persists on this strange path while the snow falls.

On a clear day, you can see Awaji Island and enjoy magnificent views of the Shikoku mountain range. But not today. As we leave the temple a swirl of snowflakes, petals and mist engulfs us. Descending the mountain, the snow intensifies, transforming the blossoming orchards into an ethereal pale pink landscape. 

With the snow persisting, we make haste for our night’s accommodation at a minshuku, a family-run, Japanese-style bed and breakfast. The friendly owners busy themselves driving pilgrims to the nearest convenience store, booking accommodation and cooking dinner for their hungry guests. It’s a convivial evening. We take turns having a hot bath, eat in shifts around the crowded kitchen table, and warm our souls with a glass of hot sake. The minshuku is so full this evening that one of our hosts sleeps outside in a tent.

Day 4. 34 km Temples 13-17

The world is snap-frozen. It’s white and crunchy underfoot, and snow dusts the mountains. The sky is clear, the light soft.

The route has us climbing again before we cross a mountain pass and follow the river to the valley below. Some of the forests we walk through are dense, dark plantations of sugi and hinoki (Japanese cedar and Japanese cypress). Others are more diverse and fringed with cascading ferns. We hear the hammering of a woodpecker and a bird with a long sustained call (a bush warbler, we later discover).

The landscape we look out upon is dramatic; steep pyramid-shaped mountains with rocky outcrops, the slopes treed in all shades of green, the rocks covered with lichen, moss, and creeping plants; the pink tinge of cherry blossom buds.

There’s an occasional working farm with a traditional farmhouse and terraces planted with fruit trees. In some places, poignant lifesize dolls in the image of former residents populate the semi-abandoned villages. But as depopulation takes hold, soon it will only be the resting ancestors who attest to the lives once lived here.  

We pick up the river again, its dry grasses silver, its surface a whirlpool of ducks. Overhead are falcons, kestrels and blue-winged herons. We walk with Steve, Carrisa & Lydia for a time. We talk as we walk about all manner of things and the kilometres go by unnoticed. It’s Steve & Carissa’s first long-distance walk and we’re impressed that they’ve chosen a difficult, 1,200-kilometre route. They tell us that they both had cancer diagnoses two months apart a couple of years ago. They’ve recovered but the experience brought home the importance of embracing life and being present in the moment, a state that a meditative walk like the Shikoku Pilgrimage cultivates. Lydia is the more experienced walker of the three. For her, the pilgrimage marks a transition in her life. She has recently retired and is preparing to go to Botswana and work as a volunteer with the Peace Corps for two years. 

Ancient trees populate the grounds of Dainichiji (Temple 13), having survived the sacking and burning of the temple by Chōsokabe, a warlord from Kōchi who rampaged across Shikoku in the 16th century. In mediaeval Japan, as in mediaeval Europe, religious institutions were centres of learning and prestige. The temples functioned as libraries, universities, hospitals and administrative centres. To burn down an enemy’s temples was to devastate their spiritual, intellectual, social and strategic capacity.

The principal image at Jōrakuji (Temple 14) is Miroku Bosatsu, a future Buddha who people believe will reappear in millions of years and save everyone. This is the only temple on the Shikoku pilgrimage dedicated to a future Buddha.

At each temple, we pause to read about its history and cultural significance. Much is written of the beauty of the temple’s carved Buddha images. In the main, these statues are hidden, and entrance to the temples where they are enshrined is generally not permitted. Buddha statues with great power are displayed only once or twice a year, or every few decades. Some have stayed in hiding for centuries, and others have been hidden from view for so long that their identity is forgotten. We begin to think of the Shikoku Pilgrimage as the walk of the hidden Buddhas. 

The esoteric rock garden at Kokubunji (Temple 15) is a designated Place of Scenic Beauty; its dry pond garden and stone arrangements are beguiling. At Idoji (Temple 17), there is a legendary well, believed to have been dug by Koko Daishi in one night. If you look into the well and see yourself, you will have good health. Michael looks into the well and sees his reflection smiling back at him. Sitting atop a stone is a work known as Ethereal Blossom. It’s a luminous pale pink glass sculpture by Kano Tomorhiro, memorialising the souls of the deceased. Nearby, there is a Shinto shrine. Its deep red lacquered torii gate, brightly coloured paper lanterns and quirky animal guardians cheer us. 

At the end of Day 4, the route loops back to Tokushima City before it turns southward. In fading light, we walk through drab new housing estates before following the Shinmachi River into the city; past flowering magnolia trees and locals taking in the last of the day. Tokushima is familiar to us and we do what we need to (laundry, shower, and dinner) without effort.

Day 5. 25 km Temples 18 & 19

We have breakfast at the charming, old-world-style Wood Ibis Coffee Shop. Then it’s over the Ryogoku bridge and straight out of town, making for the mountains. We pass solitary figures at work in their gardens, hunched over as they meticulously prune plants and pull out weeds. Further on, we find ourselves in an unkempt landscape; a liminal space between a disappearing rural world and the encroaching city.

Within a forest of trees on a small mountain is Onzanji (Temple 18), once a place where people came to save themselves from calamities and epidemics (did it serve the same purpose during the COVID pandemic?). When Kōbō Daishi came here around 814, women weren’t permitted. Because he wanted his mother to visit, he spent seven days in a waterfall performing a secret ceremony for women’s liberation. Afterwards, he was able to welcome his mother into the temple.

We peer through the wooden screens that seclude the temple and make out ornate golden lights, offerings of oranges, richly embroidered cushions, and a shadowed Buddha. Tatsueji (Temple 19), pretty with Rikyu plum blossom, is considered the fundamental place of the 88 temples of the Shikoku Pilgrimage. It’s here that we learn the error of our candle-lighting ways. We should not be lighting our candles off those lit by others. In doing so, we transfer their luck to us, without knowing if it’s good or bad luck. Another lesson learnt, we add a lighter to our temple visiting kit.

As we meet more pilgrims (a smattering of Europeans and Japanese), our temple visits become more social. We chat for a while with people we’ve met en route before farewelling them with an encouraging ganbatte kudasai (do your best, don’t give up).

We push on as there’s a deluge forecast and we’re keen to cover as much distance as possible before the weather breaks. We pass an earthquake evacuation centre, reminding us to be alert to the fact that the earth beneath our feet is volatile. Occasionally we walk on roads busy with trucks and cars but, in the main, we meander along quiet back roads, past citrus orchards and packing plants and through hushed villages. The rain beats us to the last of these villages and we arrive at our minshuku soaking wet.

The house has one spacious spare room and we’re its only occupants. Our gregarious host communicates with us via a pocket translator device and treats us like honoured guests; she runs us a hot bath and serves a delicious multi-dish dinner. 

Day 6. 20 km Temples 20, 21 & 22

It rained all night and more rain is expected this morning. We contemplate waiting it out but our host urges us to leave early. She warns that the day ahead of us will be long and strenuous.

At breakfast, her husband, busy with other matters last night, sits down and chats with us using Google Translate. He says that while the app enables clearer communication, he doesn’t feel he makes the same connection with guests as when he had to work harder and rely on eye contact and physical gestures. He tells us of his love of traditional Awa dance. For him, it’s like a pilgrimage in how he becomes absorbed in the dance and lives in the moment. As we leave, he plays a tune on a traditional bamboo flute to see us on our way.

With the rain falling heavily, we walk into the heart of the wild, beautiful, ever-unfolding Shikoku mountains. The track is steep but the mist moving through the cloud forest and shrouding the mountains is enchanting. The four-kilometre climb to Kakurinji (Temple 20) is way-marked with traditional stone milestones. The temple sits at the top of Mt. Washigao from where, on a clear day, you can see the Pacific Ocean. Kakurinji is the temple of the cranes. In Japanese culture, these birds are auspicious creatures; symbols of good fortune, longevity, fidelity and nobility.

Chilled by the rain and the altitude, we keep moving, negotiating the steep descent into the valley below. A bonsai garden; a pilgrim’s grave; a stop for a hot coffee from a vending machine in the middle of nowhere (Japan has more vending machines per capita than any other country). Then we cross the wide, swift-flowing Naka River and start climbing into the clouds again, this time through forests luxuriant with moss and ferns. 

Giant cedar, cypress and pine trees, some over 1,000 years old, cover the approach to Tairyūji (Temple 21). It’s a mystical landscape. A fifteen-minute walk on a pathway lined with Buddha statues takes us to a bronze sculpture of Kōbō Daishi. He sits high up on a remote rock, looking towards the east. He was 19 years old when he engaged in Buddhist training on this rock for 100 days, protected by a dragon god. Like other mountain temples, the remoteness and ancient beauty of Kakurinji and Tairyūji give them a sacred and mysterious feel.

After leaving the temple precinct, we follow a narrow asphalt track that gives way to dirt, down through bamboo forests to a flat landscape of rice paddies and low-lying barns. We make it to Byōdōji (Temple 22) just before the office closes. Byōdōji features a holy well, said to cure all mental and physical illnesses. Our accommodation for the night is next to the temple and soon we are soaking away the strains and stresses of the day in a hot, deep Japanese bath.

Day 7. 24 km Temple 23

Sun, after rain. The rice paddies flooded and sparkling in the early morning light. We pass an ancient cedar tree and walk through forests on an old mountain pilgrimage route, listening to the music of the wind in the bamboo.

We spend the morning with Kye from Germany. He’s a border control officer with a passion for Japanese culture. He teaches us words and phrases of use to the foreign pilgrim wanting to be respectful when greeting locals. A woman we stop to talk to tells us that her village is a sister town to Cairns in northern Australia. The relationship began with a shared interest in the migration habits of Loggerhead turtles and a belief that a closer friendship between Australia and Japan would contribute to world peace. 

Seaweed drying in the sun. Fishing boats in the harbour. Run down coastal villages with ramshackle timber houses in various states of disrepair. And then a short detour to a viewing platform where the Pacific Ocean reveals itself; the water a remarkable milky turquoise, the ethereal seascape stunning with its offshore islands, arches and sea caves.

As we follow the coast road we’re struck by the scale of the tsunami protection infrastructure; massive concrete sea walls, giant tetrapods, stainless steel gates, evacuation points, and multi-storey concrete shelters. Fortunately, the sea is benign today.

Yakuōji (Temple 23) is the last of the pilgrimage temples in Tokushima prefecture. If you make a monetary offering on each step of the correct flight of stairs – one for men, one for women and one for the elderly – it’s said that bad luck will stay away.  

Day 8. 37 km No temples

A social night at the hip Ichi Hostel in Hiwasa. A cloudy sky this morning. We stop for breakfast at a konbini (convenience store). Despite the over-packaged food, we, like most pilgrims, rely on konbinis for sustenance during the day. Lawson, 7/11, Family Mart; every pilgrim has their favourite. They are so ubiquitous and relied on by pilgrims that some refer to the Shikoku Pilgrimage as the Lawson Trail.  

Afterwards, we follow a canal out of town, past flooded rice fields and into the mountains. From up high, we look down to forests on one side and the shimmering ocean on the other. Offshore islands, coves, oyster-shaped bays. Fishing boats out to sea. Lone rock fishmen. Birds of prey hovering. A string of fishing villages, most walled by concrete.

The chattering of monkeys in the forest. Chestnut-coloured songbirds. The path strewn with fallen camelia flowers. As the weak sun reaches us, our shadows reemerge and our spirits revive.  The only people we see all day are an old couple working their small acreage. It’s been a day and a half since we met another pilgrim. Most of today’s walking is on asphalt, but the roads and road tunnels are quiet. In the fishing port of Furumugi, the nets hanging up to dry are the same saffron colour as monks’ robes. Offshore is an island of cormorants. 

The afternoon draws in on itself as we take a track around a lake to look at a famous Enoki tree. Its exposed roots are as high and solid as a stone wall. The golden light gives a lustre to the landscape and makes the unfamiliar, familiar. At this melancholy time of day, wherever you are in the world, in your heart you are always walking home.

Day 9. 14 km No Temples

The brusqueness of last night’s host surprised us. Unlike the patient Japanese people we’ve encountered to date, she showed little tolerance for the foibles of foreign pilgrims. But something has shifted in her mood and this morning she is smiling and helpful as she sends us on our way. 

The sun shining, we follow a canal before ascending a steep, rough, rocky track. We descend even more steeply before coming back out on the coast. Views of the mountains of the Muroto Peninsula. Fishing boats returning to port with their catch. Birds of prey and herons circling. Lunch on a tsunami defence wall, looking out onto the sparkling, bright blue sea that is almost too intense a colour to be real.

After walking 200 kilometres and visiting 23 temples, we leave Tokushima Prefecture midway through the day and cross into Kochi. The first stage of our pilgrimage is complete. The rituals of temple visits, the immense kindness of the Japanese and the company of fellow pilgrims have awakened us to the spirit of the Shikoku Pilgrimage. The next stage of the journey is one of austerity and discipline. Never having been in Japan before, walking the 88 temples route is a journey of revelation. How will this next stage test us? In what ways will it leave its mark on our lives? 

This is the first in a four-part series on walking the Shikoku Pilgrimage. Next is Kōchi, the prefecture of Aesthetic Training.

You might also be interested in reading about our Camino Frances and Via Francigena pilgrimages