There was no point whinging about the rain today - for once, I didn't really care. Today I'd only be walking into the grounds of Temple 38, and hopefully into a konbini to get some much needed supplies (mainly sugars, carbs and coffee). Apart from that, I'd be riding a cool granny bike for most of the day, regardless of how absolutely drenched I'd be getting. And no heavy backpack! Winner.

I can't remember the last time I saw a clear blue sky. This was going to be the sixth day straight of rainfall, and I was growing weary from it. Unless I could find a dryer (which I never could), my clothes would constantly be damp. The humidity would only make it worse too, and so I'd be wearing the same wet clothes the following day, every day. On top of that, all my socks were damp and I was hating my boots - they were meant to be waterproof, but clearly didn't do the job. Despite my best efforts at air drying my clothes last night, today would be another day of wet shirts, socks and pants. On a positive note - sleeping in the garage of temple 37 was quite possibly the best sleep I had so far along the pilgrimage. As much as I was hating the rain, nothing quite beats the sound of rain on a tin roof to fall asleep too.
Saying goodbye to Jill, I ventured out into the heavy downpour of Shikoku rain and made my way towards a Lawson Station a few blocks away.

I slept considerably well in the my little hut last night. It was relatively quiet too; surprising really since I was sleeping next to a road, but luckily there was hardly anyone driving around Shikoku roads in the middle of the night.
My body clock was now well and truly adjusted to these extremely early mornings now, and today was yet another early start. I got up and did my best at keeping quiet as to not wake my two companions, but Jill was already awake (I hope I didn’t wake her, apologies if I did Jill), so after packing in the dull light of my headlamp, I said goodbye and began my day walking along the quiet dark road.

My clothes were still damp from the night before. This wasn't a good start to the day. I had left them in front of the fan all night, hanging up on my little portable clothes-line, but the humidity was going to win this round. Temple 34 had been a great home for the evening, and once I was out the door, I knew I was going to miss it. Right next door to my room was a vending machine that supplied hot cans of Boss Coffee, so I made it a priority to grab one ASAP. It was still dark by the time I was ready to hit the road, except for the faint blue glow from this vending machine in the middle of rural Japan. I sat for my pastry breakfast on the bench next to it, sipping the hot can of coffee, with my companions being a couple of green frogs relaxing on the machine and the wet road before me.

As much as I wanted to sleep in and have a rest day today, it simply wasn’t gonna happen, thanks to practically every hotel being booked out or the cost too expensive. It had rained all night, and even at six o'clock it was still pouring down. Thankfully I had nice clean clothes to wear today, and I was extra careful putting all my rain gear on too, not wanting any little leaks or other annoyances to occur.
I had hit up a 7-Eleven the night before for my breakfast today, which consisted of the healthy goodness of ham and cheese rolls, chocolate croissants, and more iced coffees. Since I had caught the train yesterday to the hotel, effectively "cheating" a few kilometres by not walking, I decided to walk off the official trail and head towards Temple 31 through the city. By doing this, I would walk the distance that I had lost yesterday, possibly more. After breakfast I took off along wet roads of the city, that were surprisingly completely devoid of any morning traffic.
Very slowly, as I made my way towards Temple 31, I began to see Kochi come to life. Children in their traditional sailor school uniforms with their lunch boxes and umbrellas, salarymen in their suits running to escape the rain, and bumper-to-bumper traffic making their way in and out of konbinis for their coffees, just like me. And I had quite a few coffees this morning; I grew very fond of the ¥150 coffees with sugar syrup. Clearly I had an addiction problem.

So it turns out that Hagimori-san isn’t much of a sleeper. At 3am he was up early, doing God-knows-what in his kitchen. To top it off, was a pretty muggy night last night too -  at one stage I turned on the air conditioner, only for Hagimori to enter the room, unplug it, and cross his arms into a cross, the sign for a Japanese "No". That moment was also our goodbye, informing him that I’d be leaving reasonably early, and thanking the man for his hospitality. Despite our air-con fiasco, he seemed pleased to have had me stay, and we had a bit of a laugh at our feeble attempts to have a farewell conversation.
Unable to go back to sleep, I left around 5 o’clock. I had no idea it was raining until I was out the front door, so I quickly put my rain covers on my pack, got changed into my rain gear, and made my way towards the main road.
The rain was heavy this morning, so as soon as I left I took cover in a bus shelter, went though my guide book, and ate the breakfast (more sweet rolls and unhealthy goodness) that I had bought the night before. I sat here for a bit, slowly finding my energy, before continuing on to a konbini for a much needed coffee or two.

I had a damn good sleep last night, and I needed it too, because I had a bit of ground to cover today. Temple 27 was the only temple for today, but I still had roughly 30km of walking.
Temple 27 was perched high up on one of the mountains overlooking the coast. The path up was the same as the path down - nearly 4km of backtracking was going to be involved today, and I wasn't too keen on carrying my pack if it could be avoided. Luckily Misono gave me a hand-drawn map to an old lady's house the night before; somewhere I could leave my pack and collect it later.

I said goodbye to Misono the night before, knowing that I'd be on the road due to my body-clock waking me up before dawn, and the emotionally and physically draining rushing mentality, that I was having a problem shaking off me. I was having problems planning where I was to stay tonight, but Misono told me to stay in a hut that was operated by a man named Hagimori. I had heard from other pilgrims that Hagimori was well known among Japanese henros, and that he is credited for creating the list of free lodging along the Shikoku Pilgrimage. After a phone call to the man himself, Misono gave me strict instructions: When I arrive at Nishibun Station, call his number, and simply say "Nishibun Station". Hagimori would do the rest. Easy.