One Year Later

She’s getting so big.

 
This was a year ago, almost to the day, on Tokashiki Island  (Thanksgiving trip to the Keramas 2010).






Compare with the present day on Zamami Island (Thanksgiving trip to the Keramas 2011).







Of course, Logan has grown too but his most dramatic changes in the past year haven’t been physical; they’ve been verbal and cognitive.



That is all for now!

Diving In

Ah, sunrise!  Because the kids are up way too dang early.

By the time we got down to the beach, the clouds had dissipated nicely and it was a perfect day for beaching/snorkeling.

Once again, we hit all the cliches—soft white sand, clear turquoise water—AND we had the whole thing entirely to ourselves.

  
We get the kids settled in . . .

and down we go.  The water looks great!

And so do the fish.  We counted dozens of new species.  (Don’t worry, I won’t make you look at all of them.)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We saw some amazing anemones—far more than I’d ever seen in one place before.  If you look REALLY close, there are actually five anemone fish here, 3 clowns (Nemo) and 2 pink ones with a white stripe down their back.

These guys—harlequin fish—were especially plentiful.

Taking a break to trade off childcare duties and snorkeling gear.  Jake and Erik had to share mask and fins, while Jake and I were able to share the wetsuit.

Not that childcare duty was all that bad.  (But the picture would have been better without the water drops on the lens—darn it!)

 
I totally swiped this one and the next one from Erik, but check out these goofy, awesome kids.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

One more round?  Sure!

Looking down.                             Looking up.

Stopping for lunch and then back to the hotel for naps.

Wait!  What was that about naps?

Landscape for Relaxation

You know those visualization exercises: “Imagine you are on a tropical beach . . . ”?  Yah, this is one of those places that you try to imagine when you want to relax.

 

 

Zamami is a small, irregularly-shaped island, so it didn’t take us long (10-15 minutes) to hike to the opposite coast from our hotel.

 

 

 

After a little scouting, we were able to find a (somewhat precipitous) path down to the beach.  If you look close, you can see Jake hunting for the trail in the picutre.

That’s Jake holding Naomi there in silhouette. 

One of the plus sides of being there during Thanksgiving, the sun sets early enough for us to catch it before the kids’ bedtime.

This seems like a good time to stop for a snack.

    

 

Hey!  Now I know where Logan gets that crazy pirate grimace from!

 

 

 

 

 

Running, running, running.

Back to the hotel.

End day one.

Another Fine Day

Erik got to join us on our 2nd annual Thanksgiving trip out to the Keramas.  (The Keramas are a group of small islands about 15 miles off the coast of Okinawa.)  We checked out a new island this year—Zamami!

The ferry made a quick stop at Aka-jima on the way to Zamami.

Then the hotel bus picked us up from the port.

The view driving to the hotel.  You can’t see much of the beach, but that’s Furuzamami, where we spent most of our time snorkeling.

A little further up the road, this was just a minute’s walk or so from the hotel.

Check your shoes at the door and pick up your hotel slippers.  This is Japan, after all.

We had a “maisonette”-style room . . .

which allowed the kids to sleep upstairs while we hung out downstairs.  (Two more bed downstairs look just like these.)

A quick hike helped us get acquainted with the island upon our arrival.

More Zamami adventures coming soon.  Still hoping to meet my goal of being caught up by Christmas.  Haven’t made much progress here in recent days, but I did get Christmas cards sent, stockings filled and cookies baked.        

Riding through Life

  First pigtails!

Pigtails AND gratuitous baby belly!

Friends and froggy boots.  You’d think he would look happier.

This would make anyone smile: brand-new, brightly-colored, long and fast rollerslide!  I’d say this one probably rates as the best on the island now.  

Lucky Uncle Erik got to ride it.

View from the lookout above the rollerslide.

Oh, you take the high road and I’ll take the low road . . .

The path between the playground and the parking area led through a tomb village.
 

We’ve seen plenty of these “retirement communities” but we’ve never wandered through them—it’s not exactly culturally sensitive.  This was kind of an accident though.

 

New goal: must get the blog caught up by Christmas.  Of course, I also need to get Christmas cards and the last of the presents sent out.  Think I can do it all?