My last stop for the day. This is the major temple for Matsuyama. It’s big and a little confusing in its layout compared to smaller temples.
This one and temples 48-50 were deliberately placed on the east side of the city as a line of spiritual defense by a ruling lord. However, when you read about how often temples were attacked and burnt down by rival lords, I did wonder if their line of thinking was less spiritual defense and early warning fire.
Anyways, naturally when I got here I was tired but as it turned out I wandered right into a group of Americans from the University of Chicago who ogled me as this strange exhausted white guy in henro garb. I met one of them later at the onsen and we talked a bit. It was nice.
I also stayed here and the person at the desk took pains to explain that the free stay wasn’t like a normal stay at a hotel or ryokan. Of course, I already knew this. I was still a little surprised by the space though. It was like an abandoned theatre of some kind. I want to say it could have been a place of worship but there were offices being used as storage below on the main floor so it seems unlikely.
