I have been to 'Yaeyama' at the end of Aug. and loved there very very very much!!!
It was decided so sudden. One day about one and a half month ago at work, I said ......'Why don't we go to Okinawa?' and......M said 'Yes, let's go!' And so we went.
We flew from Nagoya to Ishigaki Island directly. From the aero plane window I saw the most beautiful sea I had ever seen in my life and we were already so excited!
On the first day of our trip, we spent lovely time at Taketomi Island.
Renting a bicycle right away, we started cycling ♪♪♪ It was such a nice weather with the beautiful blue sky though it was soooooo hot! Everything looked so pretty there.....narrow streets with white sand and the lovely houses whose roofs had red tiles with 'seesaa's!!!
It was exactly the scenery that I had expected to see!!! And I took so many photos, stopping here and there........so we could not proceed. And it was tooooooooo hot!
We had the first 'yaeyamasoba' for lunch, which was good!
Then we moved on to 'Kondoi beach' where the water was supposed to look emerald blue................ but suddenly the weather changed, and it was not like emerald.......How unlucky we were! Never mind! We always have rainy weather whenever we 3 of us go somewhere.......
Then we went to 'Kaiji hama', where we tried to find hoshisuna (star-shaped sand). There it started raining with the thundering! So we decided to take a break at a nice parlor. Gradually it stopped raining, and we started cycling again. We liked the lovely view from the tower. It looked absolutely peaceful...........I ♡ Taketomi.
Second day was a day in Iriomote. We joined a half day canoeing tour in the morning. We learned how to row a canue, and then we set off on the adventure!!! It was quite difficult for me. However, it was better than I had been worried. The river was so calm and quiet, as we started our journey very early. Luckily we were the only people around there.
We were totally amazed at the wilderness of the scene and absolutely excited to see 'mangrove' for the first time in my life!
Then, we got out of canues and started trecking in a jungle! It was so wild!! I liked the waterfall, Pinaisala! Amazing!! And again there were nobody! We were so lucky! We jumped into the water and it was really fun and cool! This tour was fantastic! Thanks guide!!!
Our next destination was .....Yubujima. We bought a ticket and took 'suigyusha' to the small island. I was really looking forward to looking around the island as the whole island was a botanic garden, but we could not stay very long. But still, we had a lovely time there.
Then on our way back to Iriomote we had a very magical, unforgetable experience ........... the driver(?) sang a song 'Hana' with his sanshin. We were so touched that we almost started crying................ His song, the calm water, the breeze, and the speed suigyu taking us slowly was so perfect. It was really peaceful and definitely the moment to remember forever!
Then we drove to 'Hoshisuna no hama', where we had expected to do a bit of snorkeling.We were very excited when we saw the first blue fish! How amazing to see those colourful fish♪
While we were driving we enjoyed looking at this amazingly beautiful beach. Isn't it sooooooo beautiful?!?!
Third day was in Ishigaki. On the way to our destination, we took some photos with the sugar cane field behind us. I felt I could hear the song 'Zawa wa 〜zawa waaaa〜'♪
Then, at Kabira Bay, we took a boat and saw amazing coral reef and 'Nimo'(kakure kumanomi).
Also, on our way back we went and saw those palm trees, which were so tall and impressive!
That's it! I absolutely loved Yaeyama and had so much fun♡ The nature there was so beautiful and I strongly felt I want to save this planet! Thank you for traveling together again, M&M!
