Okinawa, Japan (March 26, 2016)

Reading Length: Afternoon Cuppa Tea

Kristin Reporting!

Today we went on a Cunard shore excursion tour in Okinawa.

The ship docked at the capital city of Okinawa called Naha. Our tour started at 9:45AM, and our meeting time was 9:30AM, so we could actually sleep until a decent time. We got up around 8:45AM and grabbed some rolls for breakfast and headed to the meeting point. I guess I had my head in the clouds this morning because I had to run (literally) back to get my hat and sunglasses, and then in the afternoon I realized that I had forgotten my wallet which had all of our remaining Japanese Yen in it. So... we will now have to use a money exchange to get rid of that money. Luckily it's only equivalent to about $38.00 USD.

D in the prime legroom seat of the bus!

D said that we could probably have just seen Okinawa on our own and saved the money of paying for the tour. However, I said that I was glad we had a break from being in charge of ourselves! Sometimes its nice to just show up and then have no further responsibility for the day's plan! Also, the tour we signed up for was going to a cave and Okinawa's Shurijo castle.   We definitely could have taken the train to the castle, but the cave was a 50 minute drive outside of Naha, and Okinawa doesn't have the extensive train system that the rest of Japan does. The island of Okinawa is made primarily of limestone and it is too soft to support extensive train infrastructure. Naha only has one short monorail line which connects the Airport to Shurijo castle.

[Davin Interjection: In retrospect I think this tour was worth it, but I feel a bit more ambivalent about the ship tours in general.  I think some of them, or maybe even most, have been worth the money, but I’d prefer, when possible, to just go on my own and not be forced to stick to the pace of a group.  On future trips, I would be tempted to do more excursions on my own, I think.] 

We loaded onto the tour bus and headed off to 'Okinawa World' which is where the cave 'Gyokusendo' is located. I was concerned that Okinawa World would be another tourist trap like the Hallim Park on Jeju-Do Island, South Korea! It was to a certain extent, but it was a lot more interesting and I don't regret going to Okinawa World. Our tour guide talked for the entire drive and gave a lot of information about various things, but I mostly used my cell phone to text Scott and peruse Facebook and the news. I did catch her explaining that Okinawa had a special animal protection symbol called 'the Shisa' which is a lion that is placed on rooftops to protect the people's homes. You could see Shisa on rooftops throughout the city.

A Shisa Lion

 

When we arrived at Okinawa World, our first stop was the cave tour. It was a self-guided tour through the cave. Unfortunately that means that people can freely touch the cave formations, and they are beginning to turn black. A massive amount of stalactites have been broken off the ceiling. This was probably done in the early days of the cave exploration. The stumps are beginning to form new deposits, and at a rate of 1 mm per year, we estimate the damage was done at least 20-30 years ago. It could have been even longer ago– we weren’t carrying a ruler with us! It was really sad because the cave today is still impressive. It doesn't rival Postojnskajama or Jenolan Caves but it is worth visiting, and if it had been properly preserved it would have been able to rival some superior caves.

This cave had a massive number of formations because the cave is very active. It is very wet and has an active underground river. The 1 mm per year growth rate is very fast for a cave. This cave had a lot of what I call Elephant Columns (I'm sure there is a real name, but I don't have internet access to research cave formations!). These columns were massively thick and bulbous like the legs of an Elephant.

The best formation was in the river itself. There was a natural cave pool that filled and overflowed over a rock face and over time this has created a stalagmite that is 2.5 meters high, and 31 meters wide. I didn’t realize this pool of water was considered a cave formation until I read the sign about it. This formation has been named 'The Golden Cup'. This was the best thing to see in the cave. I’ve never seen anything like it and I’ve seen quite a few caves.

[Davin Interjection: The underground river was very impressive.  Quite a bit of water was flowing over the limestone formations and it made them look very cool in the lighting.  I suspect that water must not always flow this much, however, or I don’t think any of the formations in the river could exist.  Perhaps it is seasonal, or it could be due to increased artificial irrigation of the landscape?]

As we finished our walk through the cave, D had the opportunity to catch site of an Orc in its native cave habitat!

As we headed to the Okinawa World restaurant for lunch, we walked through a Heritage Craft area. We got to see some glassblowers at work. D seemed to particularly enjoy seeing this.

[Davin Interjection: I managed to record a glass blower at work, but I was also watching with my own eyes and I’m afraid I didn’t keep the video camera on the action the whole time.  I wanted to go back to re-record the process but, unfortunately, it was closed later!] 

We had a buffet lunch at the Okinawa World restaurant. The food was okay. It was the usual Asian buffet fare, and not the quality of going to a real restaurant. We had some good miso soup, Okinawan soba noodle soup, some sushi, and pork curry.

After lunch, we went to the Eisa Drum Performance. I really liked this show. Unfortunately, you couldn't take any photos or video. The show had a lot of energy and while not really musically impressive on its own, the drumming combined with the dancing was a lot of fun to watch. Most of the cast members were young women, and so I wondered if their participation is a relatively modern change. We did not learn any history behind the Eisa Drum Dancing. All of the cast members did an excellent job. I was jealous– it looked like being an Eisa drummer would be a lot of fun!

We had a little shopping time after the performance and we found a postcard for our door, but we plan to look for more at Shurijo castle.

Next we drove to Shurijo castle. This castle was interesting because its style was influenced by Chinese architecture, not Japanese architecture. Okinawa was its own kingdom separate from mainland Japan known as the Ryukyu Kingdom. The King of Okinawa resided in Shurijo castle. This location is equidistant from Shanghai, China and Tokyo, Japan. As such, influences from China and Korea were strong in Okinawa for a long time. It was very interesting to see a castle that looked very different from Okayama, Himeji and Nijo castles.

Shurijo castle was predominantly red, with gold and silver ornamentation. The dragon was the patron animal of the Ryukyu kings, so there was dragon ornamentation everywhere. (I know that Ryu means Dragon in Japanese because I named my koi ‘Ryu’. It’s possible it is spelled Ryuu. I can’t remember.)

Overall, it was a very nice castle to visit. The downside of visiting this castle was it was swamped with tourists. You didn't walk through the castle, you shuffled along in a massive herd of humans. I felt that it gave me a sense of what it would be like to be a part of a herd of zombies! That aspect of the visit was rather unpleasant! But not as unpleasant as if the tourists really were a herd of zombies... We did find some more postcards, so we have options for which one will go on our door.

[Davin Interjection: The castle also had soda machines which were selling Dr. Peppers.  Unfortunately, Kristin had left all of our Japanese yen behind.  But, I had an idea: the gift shop accepted U.S. dollars at an exchange rate that was listed next to the register.  So, we just “overpaid” for our post cards and got some extra yen in exchange, allowing us to use the machines!

Our guide was concerned we were taking so long, so she told us that we should catch up with the group.  After getting the soda, we ran after the group, but somehow never managed to find them!  I don’t know where they went, but it was obviously not the path straight back to the bus.  In the end, rather ironically, we made it to the bus about five minutes before anyone else.  Then again, maybe it’s not surprising, considering how slow most of the other passengers move. 

I’m really glad that I had the opportunity to go on this trip while I am still young, and physically fit (despite my other problems).  It’s nice to know that any time you’re on the verge of being left behind, you can just run and quickly make up the deficit!] 

The final stop of the tour was to visit a Awamori brewery. We didn't know this was part of the tour! Brewery tours are usually interesting, even if we don't drink alcohol. However, once you've done one or two, they are pretty much all the same.

Awamori is a Japanese liquor similar to, but different from, Sake. (Or so we were told– I have yet to taste and determine the disgustingness level of Sake!) The interesting thing about this tour is that we learned that Awamori is traditionally fermented in ceramic pots. In their fermenting shed, they had massive stainless steel vats (each holding close to 50,000L) and then a smaller amount of stacked ceramic pots. The tour guide stated that there is a taste difference between the two styles of fermenting container, so I imagine the Awamori from the ceramic pots is sold for more money than the mass produced contents of the stainless steel vats.

The awamori storage house, and a ceramic dragon.

We got to try some Awamori and it was a disgusting liquor, but not as disgusting or harsh as other liquors like whiskey. (I can rate the quality of alcohol like any other person. Just instead of saying this is good and that is bad, my scale starts with mildly disgusting and goes all the way down to utterly foul! That’s called perspective! ;p)

[Davin Interjection: I also don’t think it was as bad as whiskey, but it was very reminiscent of it, and still pretty bad.  While I don’t totally understand why people drink at all, I really don’t understand why people drink these hard liquors!  They are absolutely disgusting!]

The coolest thing about visiting the Awamori brewery was seeing the ceramics maker at work. He makes all kinds of ceramic objects, and they were for sale: mug, vases, teapots etc. We were able to record him making one object and it is impressive how quickly clay can be molded into a beautiful object ready for firing when you have the right skills! They were also selling ceramic Shisa lions and dragon heads. I took pictures of these awesome works of art.

[Davin Interjection: On the way back to the bus, the guide played a traditional Japanese instrument.  She showed the instrument to us earlier in the tour, and pointed out how it had a snake skin covering on it.  The song the guide played reminded me of several semi-traditional Japanese songs from DDR (Orion 78, Tsugaru, and Matsui Japan).  The show at Okinawa world had some parts that were also reminiscent of these songs.  The guide was a decent musician and singer, so this performance really added to the experience.  I’m glad she had the opportunity to put her skills to good use!] 

That was the end of the tour. We were delivered back to the ship about 5:30PM. It was time to go through immigration and get stamped out of Japan! I felt it was time to go, but I do love the land of the rising sun. I hope to return at least one more time in my life to use my rudimentary Japanese and give my beloved Scott a grand tour!

We turned in our passports, and then I spent the evening uploading five more backlogged blog entries to the internet. Then, I wrote up detailed bulletpoints for Davin to use to write the last of the Australian blog entries. Burned out on blog work, I finished a Babylon 5 episode. We went to bed at midnight.

Next Stop: Taipei, Taiwan (March 28, 2016)