Emerald Beach & Pizza in the Sky

On a whim last weekend, we trekked up to Emerald Beach. It's just north of the Churaumi Aquarium, and it's a gorgeous and friendly spot. (I blogged about the folks we met on the photography blog - too funny!)

I mean really. It's quiet, secluded - we paid 500¥ to rent a beach umbrella like this one and relaxed all afternoon.


Then we drove up a really big hill, through turns and twists I can't even explain - I think we turned around about 4 times because we said, "There's NO WAY this could be right.... look at this little street!"

Then we spotted some Y-plates and said, "FOLLOW THEM!" At the top of the hill, after parking and then coming around the corner and putting your name in at the front stand, you walk past the outdoor tables and see this.
Sesoko Island is there in the distance with the bridge, if you can see it. Obviously we know why this is referred to as "Pizza in the Sky". Gorgeous.

We sat with some friends and the couples they had arrived with - there were a good bunch of us, with a good bunch of kids. This is the menu:

Don't you just love that? And by the way... it's not kinds of pizza - it's just PIZZA. You get what they give you, in a small or medium pie. Done.

I ordered a guava juice for Mia - and it came in a glass cube.

Mmmm... this is the scrumptious salad. It was GOOD. Though we made the mistake of ordering one each (for Craig & I) and should've shared one!

Now tell me... wouldn't the world be a better place if iced tea were served with a little pinch-pot with tiny flowers and its own bingata place mat on this tray? More examples of Japanese presentation. So lovely (and yes, they laughed at me for taking a photo of it - but I mean really, look at it!).

Pizza. The rounds were somewhere between a hot dog and a sausage. Green pepper, corn (Of course - something about Japan is that pizza has corn on it. It just does.) and delicious sauce and cheese - wow. We ate too much.
In the evening while on our way back the sun began to set. And wow - it was a crying shame we couldn't pull over when we saw it go all the way down behind the silhouette of the hills and the ocean. It was incredible. But we did stop when we saw the amazing golden light in a marina on our way to the expressway.

There were a couple of guys out there fishing. And I'll tell you, there were fish literally JUMPING in this area. Mia, Craig and I were watching in amazement as rather large fish leapt from the water and splashed back down!

Such a pretty spot, isn't it? I've been meaning to take photos of this - so I was happy when we passed it at just the right time.
Hope you enjoyed this! I'm thinking the next photos you might see here are of Mia's first day of 1st grade.... heaven help me.

Hi. I LIVE Here.

First... tonight's lovely rainbow. This is a lousy shot of it - when we got in the car it was the brightest most amazing rainbow I've ever seen. Mia asked what made rainbows... I explained to her about the water droplets and the sun, but realized I should have just said, "It's magic, baby."

Recently I went to Sesoko Island with some girls... It's about an hour & 20 minute drive north, and the whole drive was just so beautiful - I knew it wouldn't disappoint. It WAS hot as blazes out there....and this was taken from the parking spot.

Somehow when you look at THIS:
heat isn't such a huge factor. Besides, my feet were in the water. That felt pretty good (though if it weren't for my camera, I'd have jumped in).

We were walking, and this guy showed up with an octopus ("tako") on a hook! It was still alive, and all of us got to walk up and feel what it was like to have little tentacles suck onto your fingers (it feels rather strange, but very interesting). I like this portrait very much.


On the way back, Anne stopped the van just one more time so I could snap this:
Oh yes - we will be back. In swim suits. With snorkel gear.

This is Mia with her friend (fellow only child and smarty-pants), Grace.


They were swim buds last session, and still will be buddies past the swim class thing as I will be in touch with Grace's mom. Her dad leaves for a YEAR in Afghanistan, and I think we need to be doing girl things together like tea parties and such. Especially since Grace's mom is from England. And I very much enjoy listening to her speak with that crumpets and rubbish accent.

My kid. How did she end up being this cute big girl?
She now swims in the deep end, treads water, "pencil dives" to touch the bottom, and is learning the butterfly stroke, side stroke, and breast stroke. Soon she'll be driving. (NOT)

We love it here. We've been busy, but enjoying our craziness. Friends are leaving, that's not a part we love. But I'm thrilled to have made them and I know we'll see each other very soon. As I live in a time warp on this little island.

Have I mentioned... I'm starting a business? With ITS OWN BLOG too? Yeah. That's insane! I'm excited and petrified all in the same breath. I'm realizing this tiny island grows smaller in the photog community. At Mia's swim lessons I've been speaking to Tara (who is a complete character and I can see that friendship working out very nicely) - and now to other folks who are recognizing me! My 15 minutes has started, everyone! Set your clocks, I hope it can last!

For The Web Geeks, TV Geeks & Resort Freaks

If you have no clue what this means, it's ok. I only sort of do. It's our download and upload speeds on fiberoptic cable Internet. Basically... blazin'. Craig said it's yet another reason we're happy to be living here.

I love: So You Think You Can Dance, Swingtown, Mad Men (STARTING UP SOON), and Burn Notice. Please begin watching at least the latter three shows so that they stay on TV. Take my word for it, they're fantastic.

Now - about a 15-minute ride up the road from us starts the "resort" area of Onna. It's gorgeous at this time of year - the sea has jewel tones you never thought existed in nature. But wow, don't get out of the car or you might melt. Unless you're in the water.

We went to the Renaissance Hotel up in Onna this past weekend. Mia and I had been once, we took Craig to show him. he was just as impressed.

In the lobby, there were several resident tropical birds hanging out. This is Pinkie (their names are on plates for us to read in English or Japanese):
Craig calls him the Buckeye Bird now as he is donning Ohio State colors. I think that's cool.

This is Oscar. He has a friend, Charmie who's orange - but I didn't get a good picture of him as he was preening.. very busily. Behind Oscar there's a stairway in the lobby, the bottom is turquoise and has those cool circles underneath it. It's a very pretty and tropical-looking lobby. Occasionally they have a woman on staff making balloon animals for the kids! It's a very happy place.

Mia made a friend, and they insisted in trying to give Pinkie back his feathers. He played along though, it was sweet. The other girl's parents were smiling at them too.... they were cute together.

This is the INDOOR pool. With water slides. Kid heaven. I could just leave Mia there to grow gills, she'd be fine with that.

Outside we wandered around for as long as we could stand it. Those cone-topped buildings sort of reminded me of the Hotel Del...right? To the right of this bridge were enclosures where the dolphins swam. The dolphins you could swim with if you paid enough. They're rescued, and it's an amazing program actually - I hope to do that before I leave Okinawa. (Yes, Mia was going bananas over them.)

We took the glass elevator to the top floor (12th I think?) and at the end of the hall was this. The reflection is unfortunate, but you understand why I'd put this up here. I mean... wow.

Not a postcard. A photo I took from the top floor lounge on the balcony. I hate it here. It's not like being on vacation every day or anything... I mean really. Sigh.
This is the area past the swimming beach where they give sailing lessons, scuba lessons, and they snorkel and dive. It's gorgeous, I'm dying to get out there!

Ok, more soon - I have too many photos and not enough time! nothing new. And many cool stories to share regarding my new friend, Robin. Stay tuned!

THANK YOU, TV, and Holy Photos....

First of all - Edith - you nut - you gave me an award for my blog, and that's pretty dang sweet.
(click on the photo to link to the arte y pico site)

I accept with tears in my eyes and a hug that would squeeze out all your juices. It will go in a place of honor in my home.

Ok. So TV. Seriously - I am STILL thinking about the Lost season finale. Anyone? Wow. Amazing and satisfying season, bravo JJ.

I'm excited for Mad Men, Weeds, and Californication to return. And when is Dexter coming back? I LOVE CABLE SHOWS. We've been watching Carrier, the PBS series about the USS Nimitz and loving it. I highly recommend it, even if you aren't some freaky military buff person. And I did just finally get to the season finale of the guilty pleasure, Grey's Anatomy and cried like a baby. I'm going to dig in to The Mole (which is BACK after a 4-year hiatus), and I'm heavily into So You Think You Can Dance, which in my opinion, is better than Idol. Heck yeah. What else should I be watching this summer?

Lastly - I have photos of the following to finish sifting through and will be sharing a few highlights:

a trip to Hamahiga Island
my friend Katie's new baby, Jackson Austin
a recent very nice sunset, but by no means the best I've seen
photos of friends at a recent party - even, perhaps, a photo of ME
yesterday's trip to Naha with beautiful and talented and super cool nice & fun Annya
Mia's new summer haircut (well, I haven't taken photos of that yet, but I promise I will!)

Tide you over? Well... OK.

A cool awning in Naha:

Some lovely flowers:

Sorry if this offends, but it was just out there at the mall off Kokusai...

This is one of many pig heads I saw at the market. And there were actually a lot of ...interesting things. I will post more soon.

These are not wooden boomerangs. They are smoked fish. The locals buy them and shave of pieces and then use the result to top all kinds of dishes. The resulting shavings are called bonito flakes.
I saw this adorable poster for sale at a shop and had to take a photo...
Here is Matt with new baby Jackson. Born on the same day as my new Niece, Brooke! He, however, was 2 weeks late.

Some mahi in a cooler. A guy at the Kadena Marina caught these and was giving them away. If I had any clue what to do with 20 lbs of mahi I'd have taken one.

Cool boat from our trip to Hamahiga Island
More boats.
As we were crossing the bridge toward the islands, we looked to the left and saw that the tide was not just low - it was non-existent. We pulled to the side of the road and got out, went down the steps, and squished our toes around in the biggest sand bar I've ever seen in my life. This picture doesn't really even convey how cool this was....
Ok, gotta go - kid gets home in 40 minutes from her last day of kindergarten. I know. Shut up. I'm not dealing with that yet. Just starting to grasp that I won't have days to myself anymore.

Driving To a New Beach

Here's the beach we saw and quickly parked next to:







These guys must've been from mainland where it's snowing now - they were swimming (but they really looked and sounded like they were cold!)

Thursday thru Sunday

Ok, been a few days again - already!

First of all, I'm happy to report, that after a layaway mishap we found the one and only Weber Spirit 210 on the island and I put it together this week. Finally - I can grill my dinners! Back to steak and seafood - I couldn't be happier. (Thanks, Mom - that cover finally was put to use!)

Thursday I met a few moms at a children's center not too far from home - it was fantastic! Big park area with roller slide and zip lines...

Here's Parker enjoying the zip lines - Mia (who quickly developed a Parker crush) in the background.
Parker's little brother, William. Yes - I swam in the pools of those blue eyes and lived to show you the photo....
Eli rollin' right at me!
Parker taking on the slide on his belly.
Oh goodness... and then there's Yukari. Her folks will definitely need to keep this girl under lock & key!
So since it was gloomy out, we thought the backup plan would be that the center also has an indoor part; complete with a room for toddlers & babies, a big library with some chairs and tables (even if the books were in Japanese, Mia & Parker were fine with it!) and a gymnasium. This is where the kids tried to work that hula hoop:
Really fun morning!

Friday night we went to Banyan Tree (an on-base restaurant) to have pizza. On the recommendation of a Jersey dude from Asbury Park who Craig works with and said that's the best pizza here. Well, it was ok - I'd eat it, but it's not what I'd run for if I was craving pizza. Frankly, I guess I'd just keep on craving pizza because I haven't found anything great yet. I AM hopeful - the Neatherys have a favorite place that we'll definitely try - and it might be the only place I'll go for pizza from then on.

Saturday Mia played in a soccer game and had lots of fun.
And then we headed up north for a drive. We found ourselves on Camp Schwab - the northernmost military installation here - and they had cottages at Oura Wan Beach. These were taken at the beach below the cottages. As you can see - gloomy cloudy day - WINDY too, but it was so nice that it was not hot! Here are a few gems - the rest can be found here.





Can you tell by this smile that she's slightly tired of cheesing for the camera? Not surprising.

Saturday night we went to Somchai again - this time I worked a picture of my green-lip mussels...
Oh my goodness. Everything else came to the table and was dug into so quickly I couldn't take pictures. Besides, I couldn't be bothered to turn on the camera when it smelled and tasted so fantastic! I'm drooling again just looking at this picture.

Anywho, that's the haps. Chargers lost - pathetically - to the Vikings, and now I'm watching THE game - Indi vs. the Pats - GO INDI! (However, let the record show that I do think Brady is one of the best looking football players ever.)