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“Where a Pilgrim Falls Down” : Temple 12
Gordon: An elevation profile of the Shikoku pilgrimage looks like the ECG of the last few moments of a person’s life: mostly flat, but with random spasmodic spikes. In pilgrim parlance these climbs are known as “henro korogashi”: “where a pilgrim falls down”. Today,... Read More
The Heart Sutra: Temples 6-11
Ruth: We diligently recite the Heart Sutra at every temple. Our guide book provides the Sutra in phonetic Japanese, but I think I stand a better chance of enlightenment if I at least know what I am saying. Knowing, does not, however, mean understanding. After... Read More
First day as Pilgrims: Temples 1-5
Gordon: We had beautiful weather for our first day on the Shikoku 88 Temple pilgrimage. We made our way to Temple 1 under our own power, adding about 14 kms to the distance of about 13 kms from Temple 1 to Temple 5. With 83... Read More
Making our way to Shikoku to do the 88 Temple Pilgrimage
Waiting for the train with my bike in its suitcase. Ruth: Our travel day from our guest house near Kansai airport to Shikoku was seamless and surprisingly easy. Our host dropped us back at the Ozaki train station where we bought a combination train and... Read More
Japan: First Impressions
Gordon: We arrived at Kansai airport around midday yesterday. This is one of several airports that service Ōsaka, but it is notable for being located on its own island in the sea. It is connected to the mainland by a five kilometre causeway with a... Read More
Time to head home
Ruth: We took our last ride today before packing our bikes for the flight home tomorrow. The wind was calm, an unusual occurrence in the Azores, so we headed up to the caldera. Once we were up into the cloud and fog at 500 meters... Read More
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The end of the Trek
We completed the Everest Three Pass trek in 19 days, leaving us with two days before our flight to Kathmandu. We considered various options and finally... Read More
Lukla
We had a relaxed two day walk from Namche to Lukla. As we lost elevation the vegetation became lusher and the human population more dense.Last... Read More
Return to Namche
Today’s walk was like some kind of Himalayan fantasy. We passed through juniper and rhododendron forests, strode along trails cut out of ravine walls hundreds... Read More
Thame
We had a very easy day today, drifting down from Lumden (4350 m) to Thame (3850 m). It was interesting to observe the change in... Read More
Renjo La – the Last Pass
Today we transitted the last of the three passes on our trek. They have been getting easier, but we still spent four hours climbing and... Read More