A Hiking We Will Go

So, still playing catch up a little bit, this was a couple weeks ago when we decided to venture beyond the beaches and try a bit more hiking.  The trail is called (at least by Americans) the Yamada Stone Bridge trail and it was a nice, moderate hike with lots of wildlife and a couple other interesting things to see along the way.  Unfortunately we missed the part of the trail with the spectacular views, but we’ll go back and get that another time.

Logan and Jake standing on the edge of the stone bridge for which the trail is named.  The bridge itself is really rather impressive, being remarkably old, verging on ancient, and still standing quite firm.  The drop-off on one side of the bridge (the side in the picture) is significantly greater than on the other side—no, you can’t see the bottom in the picture.

Just a random shot that I liked.  It was a beautiful day but it was HOT; it was tolerable walking in the shade but even then we were sweating a good bit.

Like I said, we missed the section of the trail that is supposed to have the best views, but what we did see was hardly bad!

And what this section of trail lacked in views, it made up for in other ways, like the caves that Jake got to check out (they were rather inaccessible for Logan and my pregnant self).  There were two smalls shrines down in the cave and an underground water source that Jake could here but not see. 
(Note to self: bring flashlight next time!)

 

 

 

 

 

 

There were several tombs, and nearby there was this naturally occurring “altar” (above) which was surrounded by prayer plaques (right) and offering boxes.

 

  But mostly what we saw were these.

       
And these.

  And some of these as well.

Oh, and this guy too.  In fact, there were butterflies and dragonflies pretty much swarming around us the entire time we were on the trail.  They were beautiful to watch, and much nicer than flies and mosquitoes!

  We stopped at the same bridge on the way back to grab some lunch.  (Nope, still can’t see the bottom.)

Yumm!

And all in all, we had another great adventure!  (But if you look close you can see the sweat on our clothing, particularly mine.)

Hope all your adventures are successful and fun!  Thanks for reading!