Miyajima Island

Miyajima is an island about one hour north of us. We took the ferry over and spent the day walking around the island. After spending the morning walking through the shops and snacking on the local "treats," we headed up the mountain. We tood the gondola ride up the mountain and hiked the rest of the way. We were disappointed when the rumors and warnings of monkeys proved false. I even brought out my chocolate covered almonds to attract them, but to no avail. I have to see wild monkeys before I leave Japan!

One thing I wish I would have gotten a picture of was the Japanese girls/women and their HUGE high heels, hiking up the mountain like it was no big deal. They put me and my closetful of teacher shoes to shame!

I think the guy on the bottom is posing. Ha!

The view from the gondola. From what I gathered from the map, Hiroshima is somewhere within this view.

We have countless pictures of cool "zen" spots like this one. Can I just live here, please?

The famous Torii off the Miyajima shore. When the tide is out, you can walk to it! When and if we get our kayaks out here, I want to paddle around it.

My yummy squid stick! Actually, it was not so yummy, but I made myself eat it just to prove to Matt I could. In yo face!

I was tempted to feed it to this little guy, especially when he tried to eat my shirt instead.

Caution: Squid sticks are yuckier than they appear.

Yuu Beach

Yuu beach is about 15 minutes away from the base and... it's where Cindy lives! It's less than a 3 minute trip from her front door to the sand. Lucky!

This floated up to the shore and Matt pretended to eat it after I said that it bore a very similar resemblance to what I had been served at a restaurant the night before. It was just as appetizing as it looks. (Think ocean-flavored gelatin)

Home, sweet home for Cindy!

Have I mentioned that the water is CLEAR!?

Chicken Shack

The favorite Japanese restuarant is Sanzoku, or more commonly known as "The Chicken Shack" by all us Americans (I've learned no Japanese place is ever referred to as it's actual Japanese name- we make up names like "The Fish Tank," "The Yellow Brick Road" and the like...). It does serve chicken, but it is far from a shack. Our friends April and Chris took us up for our first visit, along with Cindy, Sharon and David. The atmosphere was picturesque and the food was amazing! I had the BEST grilled chicken I have ever had and I don't even like meat!

Surfing Part Two

I thought I would throw in a few pictures from one of Matt's later surfing trips. The waves were a bit better. He said the last time he went the waves were even bigger.

The House

These are a few pictures of the lot and the surrounding views. Yesterday, we went to the house and within one week they had put up all the walls and the roof! I will post those pictures later, after we get them on a CD.

This our street (our house will be just to the left of this picture), with a big ol' drop-off to one side. The picture just doesn't do it justice. The ditch is deeper than our car is tall.

Our demands for pink and purple equipment were met.

On the other side of that fence is what I think is a community garden.

We love the Japanese agents!

Da Wheels

A BIG thank you to Cindy for downloading our pictures onto a CD. I am so excited to finally share some of the pictures we've been accumulating since we got here. We still aren't in our house so it will be awhile before we can do it on our own computers.

First on the list of things to share about: our cars! We got them both from a guy here on base. It was pretty much a two-for-the-price of one deal. I was expecting cars to be expensive over here (like everything else) but we got two cars for about 3,500 US dollars. Sweet! The car pictured here is the Suzuki WagonR, which you see everywhere in Japan. Back home, I used to think- How does Suzuki stay in business? No one drives them! Well, business is booming over here. EVERYONE drives a Suzuki Wagon in Japan. The second car is a Suzuki too, but more of an SUV (think two door CRV with 4 WD) which we got for skiing in the winter. Poor thing, it sits most of the time since we usually only need one car, but we will need it more I'm sure when we move off base into our house. They are both older cars, but we love them all the same. All the American's on base tend to drive the older cars, since they aren't here for very long. It actually works out perfectly, becuase we don't have to worry to much about keeping them in nice condition. The narrow roads and driveways can be a bit tricky.

Surfing

These are a few pictures from our first surfing trip. Our fellow teacher friends Adam (and his daughter Alise) and Brian asked us to join them. It was a guided trip through the base with our two favorite Japanese surfing instructors: Jumbo (yep, that's his real name) and Masa. We wore wet suits, but compared to the frigid Northwest coast, the water was very warm, especially for late October (did I just reveal how out of date my blog is?). The waves are pretty inconsistent in size from day to day,so we kind of took a gamble on whether it would be surfing weather. As the pictures show, it wasn't. The waves weren't big at ALL, but it was perfect for a relaxed day at the beach. The best part was how amazingly clear the water is. You can always see straight down to the bottom!

Masa's got skills.

Surfing without a wave: I am THAT good.

Check out that water!