Columbus Day drive

On Columbus Day (yes, we had the day off as hard-working Federal employees) Lindsay and I went for a drive on the West side of the island on a stretch running from Manzamou point to Cape Zanpa where the coast becomes very rocky. We started from the Northernmost point and worked our way South. Manzamou has some interesting (and locally famous) rock formations. This one is probably the best known. What does this rock look like to you?

















There are also several hotel/resort establishments along this stretch of the island. This one is the Manza Beach Resort with InterContinental, just north of Manzamou where the tall rocky coast ends.













On the southern end (about 10 miles) of this stretch of coastline is Cape Zanpa with its lighthouse. For 200 yen (perhaps a bit much, but worth doing once) you can climb to the top, so we did - the view was pretty spectacular.

Fun in the Park

We have walked past this park multiple times, and each time Joe comments on one of the two park "toys." Today he finally broke down and played. And I love him! Still!

Hermit Crabs

Hermit Crabs! Everywhere we go, we see lots and lots of these little guys. This film was taken on the beach right outside our apartment.

In an unrelated note, Google Earth/Maps has street view up for Okinawa! Our actual street doesn't have any images at this point, but you can see our building from another street out by Sam's By The Sea, a restauraunt nearby. These directions are kindof hard to follow, but I'll try anyways. If you type into your Google Earth/Maps search: "Sam's By The Sea Awase, Okinawa, Japan" and select option A, it will take you straight to the restaurant. From there, pick a street view panorama from out in front of the restaurant, your best bet is to pick one just in front of the entrance to the marina that has its parking lot just to the west of the entrance to the restaurant. That way you won't have anything obstructing your view to the Northwest. This picture shows what to look for in satellite view. The red circle is our building, the blue circle is Sam's By The Sea, and look for a street view image somewhere by the green circle.

If you get something like this (minus the red circle) you're looking at our building and our neighborhood! Coincidentally, we filmed the hermit crab above on the beach that is right next to Sam's, to its Northeast.

Drinks in Okinawa

Remember the vending machines all around us? When we go on walks, Joe and I keep trying to taste all of the different drinks. Here's a few that we've had so far....

I know Joe looks alarming, you have to humor him - he was trying to emulate the Japanese way of describing all their stuff. Everything from houses (Happy Sunset Mansion) to their beverages (Joyful Coffee) to their political parties (Party of Happiness Realization) just overdoses on the superlative joyous adjectives!

Whew, if we keep this up we're gonna rot our teeth! Good thing Joe's a dentist... !

Harry Potter in Okinawa

I was on my way to the 100-yen store yesterday and saw this in the music/video store next door......

My job!

As some of you may know, I recently started a very tiny part-time job! I'm the Music Teacher at a local church's Nursery School Program. Once a week, for thirty minutes, I teach 2, 3, and 4 year olds about music.

The church is All Souls Church

Here's what my classroom looks like (all the kids sit on a dot).

And the church overlooks the East China Sea.

Comprehensive Park

Saturday afternoon Joe and I went to Comprehensive Park. It's a ten minute drive from our apartment and has lots to do. There are tennis courts, walking paths, fields, ocean, beach, playground, stadium and water park. It's pretty impressive. We didn't have a chance to see all of it, but here's what we saw on our first walk.

This is one of the larger outdoor stadiums.

As we walked away from the stadium, we found a walking path. In some ways it was really similar to walking on the Metroparks paths -- the big difference was the foliage of course.

This reminded me of a Straka family picnic we had years ago, when got lost in the Metroparks. I think there was a sign (kind of!) like this that we misread and ended up way off course. Fortunately that didn't happen to Joe or I, even though we don't know what the sign said.

We took this path that lead to a cute little pond.

The carp in the pond reminded me of a family vacation we took in Vancouver (I think). Carp are the same in every pond!

I think the reason they are so crazy is that they are fed all the time. For 100 yen, you can buy a little food box.

We took the same path back out (from the pond) and ended up looking out over the Pacific.

We'll be headed back to Comprehensive Park soon!

"FirstEnergy" in Okinawa

Well, FirstEnergy isn't really in Okinawa.... but today I had my first "interaction" with the local power people.


On Monday we got the following notice:Our first planned power outage - to replace utility poles. It wasn't really a big deal, but right at 9:00 am today the power went out. I tried to take some photos of the workers, but they're not great (you're supposed to ask to take a picture). I was trying to sneakily take them while walking down the stairs!
So, while the power was out, I ran some errands. One of them included a trip to the 100 yen store. I wasn't planning on picking this little cutie up, but you know me and sheep.Especially when the tag says this! Too funny!