After sight seeing cape Muroto, my old friend kindly brought me to guest house Shiina. I could rest my left knee whole day today thanks to him.

“Oh, you arrived quite early” said the landlady. It was around 15:00 indeed, and I told her that my old friend gave me a ride to come here as osettai. She then served me a cup of coffee together with Henro-manjyu (Japanese sweet bun) which is made at Japanese confectioner in front of No.29 sacred temple. She then started to talk a bit about the story about this guest house.

The landlady has also been a Shikoku Henro Pilgrim for a while, by visiting 88 sacred temples together with her friends using buses and so on. According to her, guest house Shiina has been listed on the official guidebook for Shikoku Henro Pilgrimage quite recently. Indeed this building is originally built for her family to gather, hence she think it’s not possible to serve the room for pilgrimage everyday. However, a pilgrim who stayed here many times told her “It’s rather troublesome if we don’t know when it’s open. If you yourself are pilgrim, then you should know how convenient place it is, considering the length between No.23 and No.24 sacred temples.” Then, he actually write the recommendation letter, and gave it to her and asked her to write her name and send it. So now this guest house is officially listed in the guide book, but she also said that she cannot open everyday anyway.

Indeed this guest house is probably the only one which could fit properly into my plan, so I may be lucky that I can stay here.

After taking a bath, she served freshly cooked dinner at 17:30 so that I can take a good rest. It was surprisingly good, and she continued her story around her pilgrimage while eating. It seems that this Henro culture is cultivated widely to elder people in Shikoku.