Day 14: Adventures in Shikoku

This morning we had quite an adventure... The owner of the guesthouse, Matt, gave us a map of the area and told us about a "nice walk" to a temple. First we would come to a shrine with a few stairs leading up to it, then walk around a bamboo forest, then to a "kind of spooky" cave which leads to the temple. Boy does that man have a lot to answer for!! The walk to the shrine took at least 10-15 minutes. From a few blocks away we could see what appeared to be a giant stone wall... and was in reality 135 stone steps. -_- (Mom counted.) I said on no account was I going to climb them, but once she did it, I decided to just bite the bullet. The shrine at the top was pretty, but definitely not worth the total workout. Phew... Next, we wound up a hill to the gumdrop mountains and through the candy cane forest. Just kidding... haha. In reality we walked alongside the bamboo forest which looked SUPER dark inside before FINALLY reaching the entrance to the cave. It was so tiny we almost missed it. In we went... and apparently "kind of spooky" actually means "super dark and really Indiana-Jones-esque." It was just a long, straight tunnel, but it was so dark that we used the flashlight on our phones to see the ground. Man, I'm glad I did it, but that was pushing it a little. -_- We were proud of ourselves when we finally made it out and found ourselves inside the temple complex. From there, we walked all the way back to the guesthouse. I didn't want to be mean, so I didn't mention to Matt how much he underestimated everything... haha. :P

In the afternoon we took a local train to a nearby town called Hojo where we walked to a small ferry terminal. We were headed for Kashima, a small blob of island just off Shikoku known for its wild deer. In fact, it's so close that the ferry only takes one minute! The ferry was so cute I had to take a picture. There weren't very many people on the island. We grabbed a cold drink from a vending machine and began walking around the perimeter. Unfortunately, there were signs and barriers, so we didn't get to walk around the other side. Instead we walked back towards the ferry and past it to a beach where some families were swimming. We sat down and had a snack with the cool sea breeze blowing calmly. It was much cooler there than in Matsuyama- probably 85 instead of 92. :P Sitting there it felt like being at the ocean back home, except with palm trees and dragonflies. I was glad we made the trip out despite the difficulty of finding Western style bathrooms. :/

Well, today was full of adventures. Tomorrow we travel to Takamatsu for our last days on Shikoku. Then on to Osaka!

PS(We're still waiting for our roman to show up. See picture below.)