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For the sake of length and not overwhelming you with too many pictures at once, here is part 2 of our week in Okinawa!
March 6
Travel to Ishigaki
After a shorter-than-ideal night due to an unfortunate fire alarm at 12:40 PM (which was resolved with the help of a young Japanese man who happened to be walking by), we drove from Nago back to the capital Naha to catch a plane to Ishigaki, one of the southernmost islands of Okinawa. At that point, geographically we were much closer to Taiwan than Tokyo.
As an aside, did you know that when flying domestically in Japan nobody checks your ID? At any point! When mentioning this to some Japanese friends, they agreed that other North Americans have been surprised by the same thing, but they consider it completely normal. I asked a German friend about it and he said in the EU they don't check your ID either, just your boarding ticket.
On our way to our hotel we stopped at a fancy weaving workshop where we got to see the workers loading up a new warps, and another woman working on dying the skeins of yarn. They had hung skeins to dry in front of the building as well which was quite pretty. (top right: skeins drying, middle: resist dyed skeins (the ties keep colour from adhering there, forming a pattern when woven), bottom: a piece of weaving inspired by local beaches, left: pictures from the plane)
Night tour
After settling into our new hotel, the main attraction for the day was a night tour which was a lot of fun! There were 6 other people with us on the tour and we all had a fun time searching through the dark for things with our flashlights. The guide mostly spoke in Japanese, but he translated a few key sentences about each animal or plant into English for us which we really appreciated.
Captions! (clockwise from above left) (1) Jesse and I with part of a lantern plant on top of our flashlights. The plants are like very thick but translucent versions of the paper husks on tomatillos. (2) a small lizard chilling on a tree (3) a crab hiding from our flashlights in a crevice (4) a scorpion look-alike on a leaf. (5) Jesse holding a stick with a large blue-ish crab hanging on. Our guide left us in a small area and went ahead to find the crab, and then returned to show us. (I'm aiming a flashlight) (6) Jesse ducking under some rocks on the walk (7) a moth
March 7
Iriomote Island
From Ishigaki there are a number of ferries to other nearby islands, so Jesse planned a daytrip to Iriomote which is the largest and is mostly a national park. We were supposed to go for a hike in the morning and a mangrove tour in the afternoon, but unfortunately the weather had other ideas. Strong winds from the north meant the ferries to Uehara port were cancelled so we had to go to Ohara first and then take an hour long bus around the island. However, that meant we would miss the meeting time for our first tour.
After calling the tour company to explain and cancel our morning activities, we kept the mangrove tour for the afternoon and walked around the very small neighbourhood near the Uehara port for the remainder of the morning instead. While not our initial plan, it was still interesting. All the plants are so different, and so green for early March. We even saw pineapples growing! No clue what the name of the fruit next to Jesse's hand is, but it was growing on many trees next to the road.
Mangrove tour
And now the mangrove tour! We learned that a mangrove is where the ocean and fresh waters mix, and they develop a very unique ecosystem as a result. Freshwater plants can't handle the ocean salt, while ocean plants also can't survive in fresh water.
Different plants have evolved different techniques to regulate the amount of salt, but the mangrove trees specifically have developed the ability to concentrate the ocean salt in a few leaves which then turn yellow and die off. This removes excess salt from the tree as a whole and lets the remaining leaves thrive.
These trees also grow in sediment deposited by the rivers, not in ocean sand. The sand here is made from coral fragments and is much coarser than I am used to, but the mangrove sand was much more like a fine dirt. It was also much darker, especially in contrast to the near-white coral.
We couldn't bring our own phones due to the risk of them getting wet, but our guide had her phone and so she sent us plenty of pictures afterwards.
March 8
Diving
We were really getting in all the water sports on this trip, because we were up bright and early on March 8th to go scuba diving and snorkeling! The company we chose to go with explicitly advertised their level of English, and a number of reviews also said the English was quite good, so that put us more at ease. They picked us up at our hotel, and after about half an hour we were at the main base to get suited up in our wetsuits. We were also given extra wetsuit-vests with hoods to wear underneath which was appreciated.
After a short drive to the beach we waded into the ocean and boarded a boat. It was a rather bumpy ride out to the dive spot since it was a windy day, a small boat, and ocean waves are big. However neither of us felt sea-sick! I did make a point of watching the horizon though. The one time I looked away my vestibular system told me very quickly that was a bad idea.
There were two certified instructors with us, Harvey who owns the company and stayed on the boat, and Yuko who would be in the water with us. Yuko demonstrated each technique while Harvey explained. One thing I didn't know is that when diving you wear a belt with weights to pull you down, and then you have a vest that you inflate or deflate to control exactly how high in the water you are floating.
I did know that you had to equalize the pressure in your ears, but I didn't realize you did it as often as every meter or two as you go down. And you have to do it again if you say, swim up a bit to go over a piece of reef and then come back down again. It isn't always easy but we both got the hang of it eventually.
Thankfully our ears and breathing were our only main concerns, Yuko handled the equipment for us, keeping an eye on our air, as well as inflating and deflating our vests as needed. And reminding us to slow our breathing. There was so much to pay attention to, I found I could slow my breathing just fine when I focused on it, but as soon as I started paying more attention to our surroundings I would forget and speed up again!
One fun thing about your breathing, is you can really feel how the amount of air in your lungs affects your buoyancy. With a full breath you started to float up a bit, but after a long exhale you sank a noticeable amount! It was kind of fun. :)
We saw all sorts of wonderful things! There were lots of fish of various colours, schools of fish swimming around the reef in clouds, a strange bright blue clam-ish thing wedged into the reef, a mantis shrimp, sea snakes, even sea anemones with clown fish. The best part though was the turtle sleeping on the reef. We were able to get surprisingly close. The pictures don't quite show the best angle, but in real life it looked quite comfortable and peaceful laying on the reef.
Eventually I got too cold so we came back up to the boat to warm up a bit. Thankfully they had loose wind-breaker jackets with giant hoods for us, so even without the sun I warmed up enough to go snorkeling in not too long.
I see why folks who live near the ocean learn to dive, because when snorkeling you get tossed around a lot more by the waves. It's much calmer diving and it is also warmer, at least in winter, because the water isn't being tossed around by the air, although I did like that it was easier to talk when snorkeling. Hand signs only while diving!
We snorkeled on the other side of the boat, and were lucky enough to see 9 cuttlefish! Yuko said the last time she was out there was only 1 so were really lucky. We also got to see a turtle swimming along (unsure if it is the same one who was napping). They are so relaxed as they bob along, taking a breath of air and then diving down again to keep calmly swimming.
After we were thoroughly chilled we put our jackets on again and headed back to their base location where Harvey's wife Miki (who is also an instructor when Yuko has days off) had made lunch for us. A warm shower was very welcome, and so was the delicious lunch! There was a tomato and vegetable stew, salad, rice, and some grilled chicken. I think everyone had seconds. All three of them joined us on and off for lunch and it was quite nice to chat and discuss our various backgrounds. While Yuko and Miki are both Japanese, neither grew up in Ishigaki, and Harvey is Malaysian. Plus Jesse and I always appreciate the chance to have a proper conversation with someone other than each other! 😉
As an aside, the previous night we also had a fascinating conversation with the chef of a South Indian restaurant. We tried dosa for the first time (delicious!) and then we got talking about how he ended up in Ishigaki and I think we chatted for almost an hour. If you want a guaranteed place to find an English speaker in Japan, visit any Indian restaurant. They serve local folks in Japanese, Jesse and I in English, and chat amongst themselves in a third language!
Cycling around Ishigaki
Diving, while very fun and busy, only filled our morning and a bit of the afternoon, so after a quick nap we decided to rent bicycles for a few hours and explore Ishigaki. There was an observatory nearby high on a hill, as well as a limestone cave on the way. Unfortunately the observatory was too high with the heavy (and slightly too small) bikes, but we did make it to the cave.
It was very quiet at the cave, I think we only saw one or two other couples in the entire thing. It was similar to the cave at Okinawa world but they made some different choices with the lighting which was pretty. I love all the different textures that form based on subtle differences in the rock deposits.
After the cave we cycled downhill to a beach a few kilometers away. We managed to find side roads that followed the main road almost the entire way, and it was a really lovely time cycling along the quiet and lush laneways instead of the main roads.
March 9 and 10
Visiting Sendai
Jesse had scheduled his next orthodontist appointment for the Monday after our trip so we flew from Ishigaki back to Tokyo, and then took a Shinkansen north to Sendai.
While there we visited some of our favourite coffee shops and restaurants, and went out for supper with some friends. All in all a lovely and relaxing way to end off our vacation. One last plane flight from Sendai to Hiroshima and we were back home (and in our comfy bed)!
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