Today I went for my planned hike to Biwa-ko. I knew I needed an early start so I began my journey at 9:30 in the morning. I had alittle bit to eat and drink, grabbed my camera and set out the door. I knew from my estimated timeframe that this venture would take around 8 hours to complete. Here is a simple breakdown of time; 2 hours for travel time outside of the Daimonjiyama trails, 6 on the trails in the forest. When all was said and done my approximation was pretty close. 7 1/2 hours in total of walking non-stop. Once I made it to the foot of Daimonji the hiking really began. Up and up I climbed at a nice quick pace making it to the top in about 20min. Of course by the time I reached the very top I was rather tired. I knew this to be the peak so I didn't worry about it too much. The trail was quite busy until I reached the peak then I didn't see another person for another 2 1/2 hours. I found signs pointing to a temple so I decided that would be my destination. I was pretty sure that would take me to Otsu city and lake Biwa. I continued on for some time and saw a sign for some sort of koen off to the right. Sometime I will have to go back and see what it is, but for the time being the temple was my destination. I continued alittle bit further and ran into an old shack and what looked like a newer building, but passed them by also. I knew if I wanted to spend anytime in Otsu when I got there I would have to bypass anything of nominal interest. Eventually I got to the top of the hill where the trail began to decend again. It popped out onto a small road with some sort of electricity place at the top and went down the road alittle ways and back into the woods and down down it went. About half way down I ran into my first wild monkey. It looked and me then ran away. I wanted to get a picture, but oh well. Again I ran into another power station place making a loud humming noise. I continued down some more and got to a small clearing with about 4 different options, one in each diretion and another in one of the directions. I was kind of at a loss for which way to go. I first chose forward direction 1 but soon found it overgrown and unpromising. Then I chose forward direction 2 and again found my self at a point in which I didn't want to continue without some sort of sign. I walked back to the clearing and by now had wasted a half and hour going down bad trails. I went to the left this time and what do you know but I found a sign pointing to the temple only alittle ways in. I continued down and down some more and found some signs of people; I several small graveyard areas. As I continued down I started to hear people talking and then saw a couple of houses and people burning something. Hurray I made it, I was now in Otsu. I shortly thereafter made it to the temple I was looking for. This was not just a temple but a big temple complex. I walked around for awhile taking in the sights and found a nice overlook of the city. Not a very big city as far as I could tell, but was built on the shores of Japan's biggest lake, Biwa-ko. The lake didn't really look all that interesting so I didn't actually go down to the water, just took some pictures from my vantage point. I got something to drink and wandered around alittle bit more. Then I figured it would be best to start heading back. I wandered into the forest and returned down the same paths I had travelled to get there. Eventually I made it back to the top of Daimonjiyama. I found there an Italian fellow speaking English with two Japanese fellows. They were talking about food. I butted in and asked about any particularly good vegetarian food in Japan. I've had some, but thought they might know something I had not tried. Not much luck, but good to talk to random people. I left and wandered back into the city. When I had made it back to the Kamogawa I ran into an English fellow playing the shakuhachi. So of course I had to stop and talk to him for alittle bit. I studies under the Tozan school. He was just on vacation and planning to take a lesson while in town. After that I just walked back home with my weary feet and sat down to eat. After almost eight hours of walking on just nomimono and some cereal I was getting hungry. The day was at an end and soon I let myself go to sleep.