I didn't get very far before my leg muscles twanged and trembled in protest. And that was only at the half-way point. By the time I reached the top and limped across the courtyard to the hondo and the temple office, I was seeing spots in front of my eyes. I sat on a bench in the temple compound to rest and read a guidebook.

According to legend, Kobo Daishi founded the temple in honour of a beautiful young girl. Every day, while he performed his meditations in a mountainside hut, she interrupted her cloth-weaving -- kirihata means "cut-cloth" -- to bring him food. Eventually, she told him her story: Her mother had been a lady of the court in Kyoto and her father an officer in the court guard. Before she was born, her father had been exiled for his part in a rebellion and her mother, fearful of the danger to her unborn child, prayed to Kannon, the Buddha of compassion.

Her prayers were answered and she managed to flee to Shikoku where she raised her child until she died, leaving the daughter alone. Kobo Daishi was so moved that he carved her a statue of Kannon and, heeding the girl's wishes, ordained her as a nun. She immediately attained enlightenment, or Buddhahood, and changed into a statue of Kannon joining the one Kobo Daishi had carved. Kobo Daishi took the two statues and enshrined them in the temple he built in the girl's honour.

Kirihataji is understandably popular with Japanese women. Before Kobo Daishi, women were thought incapable of Buddhahood. Women had to be re-born as men to have that potential. Kobo Daishi's teaching of Sokushin-jobutsu -- that every person has a Buddha-nature and is capable of attaining enlightenment "in this very body, in this very life" -- changed that attitude.

Arguably, it is these influences that have made Kobo Daishi "the most prominent and influential individual figure in popular Japanese religious history," as Ian Reader writes in Religion in Contemporary Japan. In 828, for example, he founded the first school for commoners, providing food, shelter and education. This was unheard of at the time: Only aristocrats could obtain an education.

At Temple 10, I had my first tickle of faith in Kobo Daishi, my first inkling that there might be something to the notion he walks with every pilgrim. I was parked on the bench, admiring at the statue of Kannon, trying to ignore my body's whining at the prospect of the afternoon's walk ahead -- nearly 10 kilometres across the Yoshino valley. That's when I saw the shaven-headed young man with whom I'd shared the dining room at the Minshuku Soshokudo the previous night. He was walking toward me, accompanied by a thin-faced, middle-aged man wearing glasses and a ball cap and a younger man with long black hair. They bowed as a group. I stood to return the gesture. The shaven-headed youth rattled off something in Japanese.

"Gomen nasai," I said. "Nihongo ga sukoshi dake dekimasu."

"I'm sorry. I speak only a little Japanese."

"Ah, you are American?" he asked in halting English.

"Iie, Kanada-jin desu," I said. "No, I'm Canadian."

The young man was Hiroshi Yoshida, a university student from Osaka. He was dressed as a henro with a straw hat and white vest. The others were Shuji Niwano and his son, Jun, from Tokyo. Neither wore pilgrim garb. Nor did they carry walking staffs. But they were the first fellow pilgrims I met on the Shikoku no Michi. They wanted me to take their picture. Niwano-san then asked if I would pose with his son.

The request had considerable consequences. Niwano-san and I struck up a friendship -- he would eventually honour me by saying I should address him by his first name, Shuji -- that would make my pilgrimage immensely more fulfilling, both in terms of companionship and the doors it opened on Japanese customs and attitudes. Thanks to Niwano-san, I would meet people, learn things and do things that would not have otherwise been available to me given my lack of language and knowledge of Japan.

After we performed our pilgrim duties we made our way down the long flight of stairs to the Fujiya restaurant. It was little more than a few tables and a half-dozen stools huddled around a counter. I couldn't make up my mind if the floor was packed earth or hadn't been swept in a long time. On one wall were faded pictures of henro and temples, along with dozens of name-slips. There was also a calendar, dated 1996, with a picture of the Toronto skyline, the CN Tower its centrepiece. The place was run by Takeko Hara and her daughter, Mayumi. They fed me my first udon, for which I shall always be grateful.

Udon is a classic Japanese dish. The thick noodles are made from white flour and simmered in a broth with other ingredients -- soft-boiled eggs, beef, shrimp or fish -- and served in a large, heavy bowl. It is delicious and filling and no one objects to the loud slurping noises you make because they make the same noises, too. I remembered to say itadakimasu -- the Japanese form of saying grace, meaning, literally, "I will receive" -- as the bowl was placed in front of me.

My only difficulty was picking up the long slippery noodles with chopsticks. It earned laughter. Before we left, the mother had us sign our name-slips. Hara-san wanted them for her collection. She was going to tape mine next to the Toronto skyline picture.

We walked the rest of the afternoon as a group, crossing the wide gravel bed of the Yoshino River and following the path through the town of Kamojima and into the foothills. I asked my companions why they were walking the Shikoku no Michi.

Hiroshi-san said he was taking a break from university. Niwano-san's English wasn't good but he managed to explain that 30 years ago he lived in Imabari, a town on the north side of Shikoku where he had met his wife, Ikuko, and where Jun was born. They moved to Tokyo, but he had always wanted to return. When he retired he decided to walk the Shikoku pilgrimage with Jun. Niwano-san's motives were, in part at least, driven by his concern for Jun, the eldest of his two sons.

"Jun is not strong," Niwano-san said in stilted English. He looked up the road toward Jun and Hiroshi. "He has a condition."

I had already noticed that Jun's behaviour was not normal for a young man in his 20s. While he was friendly and eager to talk -- even now at a distance I could hear Jun chattering away -- he was impulsive, almost desperate, in his actions. Whenever we met another pilgrim on the road, Jun practically leaped at them to talk and ask questions. He wasn't aggressive; he just couldn't summon much self-restraint, or awareness that it was necessary on occasion. It was the same thing with dogs; Jun would inevitably run at any we encountered, wanting to pet them. The dogs, however, snarled and barked at his charging approach. He was always surprised, and hurt.

Over the next few weeks, walking together for at least part of each day, I heard more about Niwano-san, his hopes and fears regarding his son and family -- confidences that both surprised and humbled me. Unlike North Americans, the Japanese aren't given to discussing their private lives with strangers. For some reason, Niwano-san confided in me. Initially, I suspected he did so because I was a gaikokujin, an out-of-country person, who provided a sounding for things he couldn't otherwise say. A pilgrimage invites intimacy. Your mutual aches and pains, the shared endurances of the trek, encourages an empathy you wouldn't normally feel for those who aren't friends or family.

I was told that Jun had suffered some kind of nervous or mental breakdown several years earlier, and, it seems, never fully recovered. He had had to leave school and was unable to hold down a job. And now he lived at home, largely spending his time in his room listening to music and watching television. Niwano-san hoped that walking the Shikoku no Michi would help Jun overcome his self-imposed isolation and regain his self-confidence and health.

We reached Fujiidera Temple, Temple 11, a few minutes before the office closed at 5 p.m. Before we caught a taxi back to Kamojima, where we each had rooms in various hotels or inns, I walked past the main hall and looked up the path leading into the mountains. That's where I would walk the next day on my way to Shosanji, Temple 12. My guidebooks described the path as a long, hard climb.

Shosanji is one of six nanshos, or perilous temples, that pilgrims find most difficult to reach. You're forced to climb from an elevation of 40 metres at Temple 11 to about 700 metres just before Temple 12 -- the second highest elevation on the entire route -- following a path that is near perpendicular in places. Little wonder the path is referred to as henro korogashi, or "pilgrim falling." You can see the gravestones of fallen pilgrims scattered along the route.

The day started pleasantly, sunny and cool again. I left the Central Hotel about 6:30. My feet seemed fine -- I had wrapped them in moleskin just in case -- and the stiffness in my legs disappeared after a few minutes. At a kiosk in the Kamojima train station, I bought a bento, an all-in-one-box meal, for lunch, along with a can of Georgia Cafe au Lait, two bottles of Pocari Sweat and two bottles of water.

The trail was a tease. It began with a slight incline that led gently into the shade of a cedar forest. The air was cool and damp and pungent. Nightingales noted my passing. Suddenly, a set of stairs cut into the ground and the trail climbed steeply into the trees. And kept climbing. And climbing. Until it reached a plateau that offered a view of the Yoshino River valley. I was huffing and puffing too much to appreciate the panorama. I dropped my pack and collapsed. I pulled out my map and looked at my watch. It had taken 30 minutes to climb one kilometre. I knew then I was in for a long day.

The trail followed a seemingly endless series of peaks and valleys. I'd reach the summit of one mountain only to drop to a valley floor and have to climb all over again. I filed along ridges that fell away in vertiginous drops. It was easy to imagine plummeting over the edge and disappearing in some tangle of dark wood.

The path, slippery and soggy from spring rain, was so steep in places I practically climbed on hands and knees, my face only inches from the root-tangled earth. My boots were soon heavy with mud. I had to clamber and leap over boulders -- no easy task with a 15-kilogram pack. I was grateful for Kobo Daishi, my walking staff, which saved me from twisting an ankle, or worse. After a few hours, my leg muscles whimpered and my heart hammered like bass drum. I envisioned a blood vessel bursting and my body lying at the edge of the trail.

It took four hours to cover a little more than eight kilometres. By the time I reached the small temple of Yanagi-no-mizu-an, nearly halfway to Shosanji, I was wet, weary and wondering if I would make it. I flopped in the dappled shade of a camellia bush.

When my heart beat seemed more or less normal, I pulled out the bento. Turning back the lid, I found three pieces of sushi, some tempura vegetables, several slices of kamaboko, a sausage-like fish-paste roll, slices of bamboo shoot and squash, and three onigiri, triangular chunks of rice wrapped in seaweed. It was gone in minutes. I drained a bottle of water and a bottle of Pocari Sweat.

I wanted to sit in the shade and listen to the buzz of insects and watch the sway of the cedars, and, somehow, without effort, get where I wanted. That's when I heard the tinkling of a bell. I looked up from my self-pity. Two men came out of the forest into the temple clearing. Both wore henro robes and hats and carried the requisite walking sticks.

The taller man had a long, lean face and walked straight-shouldered like a soldier. I guessed him to be in his late 60s. The other had dark, grey-flecked hair. He looked to be in his 50s. They bowed and greeted me but did not pause. When they disappeared around a corner in the trail, I stood and stumbled in pursuit of the bells I thought I could still hear. If they could continue, why couldn't I?

The path started to climb almost immediately and I was soon back to wondering if my heart would hold out. But I received encouragement from another source. I had noticed little statues of Jizo, the bald-pated deity who guards children, the souls of the dead and travellers, every few hundred metres along the trail. He has the power of salvation, and is known especially for helping the souls of children in their task of building a bridge across the river of the underworld so they can cross to find a happy rebirth.

Stone Jizo statues are everywhere -- roadside shrines and temples, on the edges of farm fields, at intersections, in cemeteries and, as I discovered, along mountain trails. During those last kilometres to Shosanji, I adopted Jizo as my personal protector, the guardian of out-of-condition gaijin pilgrims.

I marked my progress by how many Jizo statues I saw, forcing myself to count three before taking a break. Each break lasted only long enough to let me catch my breath and allow my heart to return to a less hysterical beat.

I refused to look at my watch or calculate the remaining distance. You'll get there when you get there, I told myself, remembering what my father said on Sunday drives. It didn't help when I spotted the occasional grave marker -- short, pillar-like stones on the side of the trail, often huddled around a Jizo statute. They were covered with lichen, half sunk into the earth, nameless except for the word henro carved into the stone.

There were times when I was desperate for the sight of one of the little statues, peeping out from behind a tree or bush or hanging out on some wet trail corner. I stabbed the trail with my stick, putting one foot in front of the other, until, coming around a bend, I was confronted by a set of stone stairs. I looked up. At the top stood a six-metre-high statue of Kobo Daishi, behind a wrought-iron fence in the shade of a huge cedar. A sight for sore legs. Had I finally made it? I looked at my watch -- nearly 3:30. I had been on the trail for more than eight hours.

I re-checked my map. I had only reached Ipponsugi-an, a small shrine; I still had an hour's walk ahead of me. But the trail was downhill for much of the way. The path dropped through orange groves and orchards of cherry trees. The pungent ripeness of the orange trees in bloom mixed with the sweet and softer perfume of the cherry blossoms. I walked through a cathedral of scent. By the time I crossed a rushing stream at the foot of the mountain -- elevation 422 metres -- and began the final climb to Shosanji, I was feeling more charitable toward the world.

But I was flagging, my steps leaden. My legs wobbled, thigh muscles twitched. Feeling faint, I almost fell several times.

I also heard bells. Normally, the sound was irritating, especially the bells attached to pilgrim walking sticks. But this was the sound of salvation, telling me a fellow pilgrim was ahead, and if he could do it, so could I. Except, I couldn't be sure I wasn't hearing things.

I stopped and listened and, yes, there it was again: Some pilgrim, bless his osame-fuda, was bonging away at the Shosanji bell, announcing his arrival to the gods. A few minutes later, I emerged from the forest to face a final set of stairs that led to the temple gate. Soon, I was banging that bell myself.

Two hours later, I nearly fell asleep in the o-furo. I was as relaxed as an udon noodle. I might be stiff and sore in the morning, but right then all aches and pains had melted away.

Despite my fatigue, I was restless. Instead of returning to my room, I decided to stroll around the temple compound. Crunching along the gravel pathway toward the temples in the gathering dusk, I spotted the neon light from a bank of vending machines and bought a hot Georgia Cafe au Lait. I sat on a bench and stared across the valley. In the distance, the dark, sawtoothed peaks of mountain ridges rippled away to the southwest, turning from blue to purple to black. I sat nursing my coffee as the mountains became one black mass against a star-plastered sky.

The day had been hard and there would be others like it ahead. But I'd done enough long-distance hikes to know the first week is always the hardest. Your body needs time to adjust to walking for hours. More crucially, the mind needs time to adjust. Anybody in reasonable health can walk 20 to 30 kilometres for a few days. But knowing you have to walk that distance every day for weeks throws up a psychological barrier. You're tempted to find any excuse to chuck it because you know it's going to get worse before it gets better. So why was I doing this?

Certainly, the Shikoku no Michi offered the lure of the exotic and appealed to my sense of adventure. While much of Japan is covered by asphalt and concrete, the Shikoku pilgrimage offered a sojourn through a part of the country that still possessed some wildness and was little visited by foreigners. There was also the fact the Citizen was sponsoring my trek.

But there was more to it than an expense-paid adventure. If all I was doing was visiting 88 Buddhist temples, why do it the hard way? Why not travel by train, bus and taxi. I'd walked 40 kilometres. I had 1,300 kilometres to go. What was I trying to prove? Come to that, to whom was I trying to prove what? I wasn't a Buddhist, so I couldn't claim a compelling religious motive. I even hesitated to ascribe spiritual motives to myself.

Sipping my coffee, I remembered a line from The Inland Sea, Donald Richie's marvelous travelogue of a boat journey he made on the seaway separating the main Japanese island of Honshu from Shikoku.

"A journey is always something of a flight," Richie wrote. "You go to reach, but you also go to escape." What was I escaping from? Or to?

I had hiked across northern Spain in 2000, walking the 800-kilometre Camino de Santiago, one of the oldest pilgrimage routes in Christianity, from the French border town of Saint-Jean-Pied-de-Port to the Galician city of Santiago de Compostela. It is there, legend has it, the bones of St. James were buried.

Memories of that pilgrimage still come back -- the peacefulness of a sun-splashed forest path, the empty early morning streets of O Cebreiro, the far horizon of the Spanish meseta. But what I most remembered were those rare moments when, after my body -- and my mind -- had grown accustomed to the walking, a deep sense of peace and detachment settled on me. My mind was no longer filled with the clatter and crush of everyday life.

I took a last swallow of my now cold coffee and returned to my room. I prepared my pack for the morning, opened the window, turned out the light and crawled beneath the quilt on my futon. Just before I fell asleep I heard someone chanting sutras.

Follow Robert Sibley's Japanese pilgrimage in coming weeks in the Weekly. Next episode, May 15: The road to Temple 18.