Yoron, Okino-erabu, and Tokunoshima

Last week we accompanied Masaru on his monthly sampling trip to three islands north of Okinawa. Megumi also joined us for part of the trip. We took the ferry, where you can lie down in rooms like the one below or get beer from the vending machines to pass the time. It took two hours to get to each island not including coming into and out of port. We watched many flying fish from the deck as well.



The first island was Yoron. Here is a view of one of the beaches. We stayed in a hostel type hotel, with the boys in one room and girls in the other. Some of the dives were really great, but of course, the pictures don't do them justice. Below is Nate, amphipod collector-in-training and a view of the reef with Megumi and Nate in the distance. Unfortunately we did not get a picture of the two 80 something ladies fishing at the port in Yoron. They drove their scooters with wagons behind them to hold all of their gear. They already had a few good size parrotfish in the cooler. Masaru and Megumi could not understand their island language, but it turned out that they also spoke Japanese.



The next stop was Okino-erabu, with a typhoon southwest of us, making big waves and preventing us from diving on the southwest side of the island, where Masaru's collecting site is. We spent the first evening with the owner of the hotel and his buddy who can make Shochu glasses out of a beer can using a lighter. Nate is determined to master this trick! We drank beer and shochu (a type of rice wine that is best fresh...not aged like typical wine) all night and learned a lot about Japanese and island culture. Japanese people typically eat all animals (except insects) and all parts of those animals....see below!



The last stop was Tokunoshima, where we met the bread man, an over-friendly hotel owner who makes bread and gives it to his guests. The diving was great here, but thanks to the full moon, so were the currents! We fought the current swimming out to the reef wall at one sight for almost 1 hour before we started our dive. It was well worth it though. We got some great looking rubble and hopefully tons of amphipods! The boys were pretty tired out after this dive!



Here are a couple of videos of the ferry coming into port. It was pretty impressive to watch.
They throw the line and pull it in all by hand!