There was a save point right before you fight Tenshi on Bhava-Agra, when you have free control of your characters. It was to the right. There's also a save point in Yuuka's scenario (it's one of the crystals). o_o;
Ugh...that's bizarre. I've never seen THAT happen with the maze. The directions the flower gives you are in reverse order (so starting from the maze entrance to the Bloody Lake entrance, you want to write the directions down, and then reverse them. Yes, one flower will speak twice, but that's actually supposed to be that way. You could also opt to give Yuuka the Vanish Charm, if you have it, to avoid physical attacks completely. Make sure she's stacked with +Speed stuff otherwise (such as Aerial Garland, and if you won it from Kurumi, the Hunter's Knife is the best +Speed weapon in the game for anyone).
Have you tried using Flower Shooting? It should work if you really need to fight random encounters, outside of the Forest Fairies (the Rusty Yin-Yang Orbs should be beatable with it anyways). Bosses aren't immune to Earth either so rely on that instead.