Clouds and Islands

Well, not much happening here with us in Amami. Is the rainy season finally over? It's usually over by July, but we've had torrents of rain, where it doesn't let up all day. It's a novelty for a while, since it doesn't rain for 6 months out of the year in California. But enough is enough. Everything is damp and molding. We all bought plastic sandals because our cloth and leather ones were rotting. It's been sunny for a couple of days, so maybe it's finally over. Anyway, Theo pretty much has what little we've been doing in his blog. Here are some pictures I took from our various plane flights between the islands.

This is Amami Oshima, where we stay. There are extensive reefs of mostly dead coral, and lots of forested land, although this is the northern part near the airport, where it's mostly agricultural. The water has been murky with all of the rain, too, so not good for snorkeling and underwater photography.

I love the clouds here. We are so cloud deprived in California.

Ishigaki coast. The nice thing about flying to the southernmost islands of Japan is that we go to fly over most of the islands south of the mainland.

The isthmus of Ishigaki.

I think this is Okinawa. We landed there for a brief stopover. It probably used to be a nice island before they leveled it, paved it, and erected an endless row of monstrous megaresorts. Throw in an American military base and that pretty much does it. We went there a couple of years ago (The Big Nawa) and that was enough for me. It really made me appreciate how relatively unspoiled Amami is.

Maximum development.

Shades of blue.

The island of Dr. Moreau?

Yakushima. Not a great picture, but one of my favorite places in Japan. (We also went there in 2008. See post here.)

In contrast to the southern islands, this is Osaka, in the typical Japanese urban shades of gray. I'm always glad to get out of the city and back to the green hills and blue waters of Amami.

Yubu- Water Buffalo Island

One of the attractions on Iriomote is a water buffalo cart ride to the tiny island of Yubu, a botanical garden. The water is only a few inches deep between the islands, so you can actually walk, but the touristy thing is to take the water buffalo cart.

The stretch of water between the two islands.



Masami and I walked, just because I wanted to say I walked to an island. Theo rode in style. It was hot, too and I thought the water would cool me off. After seeing the buffalo fertilize the water, I can see why people paid to ride in the cart.


Tough buffalo. I guess I'd be a little irritable if someone strung a rope through my nose and made me pull a cartload of tourists, too.

The shell house was part of the gardens.

Manta rays migrate past the islands, but I guess you need to scuba dive to see them. Maybe next time.


Why won't this buffalo move?!

Butterfly house.

Water lily.

Cooling off. I wanted to jump in with them. I was so delirious from the heat I tried to take a bite out of a plastic ice cream cone (thoughtfully offered by my favorite son).
More Iriomote wanderings:

Pinaisara Falls from a distance. It was a long walk across the mudflat, and it was raining, so we skipped it.

Kayaks don't do much good in the mud. I saw a group of people dragging theirs back. They probably paid $100 for the privilege.

Beautiful blue water.

Hoshisuna beach had a reef that was kind of like a pool, closed off from the ocean, with warm, soupy water. It was popular with families, but still had a lot of coral.

The tide was so low, the live coral was above water. I've never seen this before.

Sakishimasuonoki Tree Community (say that fast three times).

The mudskippers and snails make mazes of trails in the mud when the tide is out.

Beautiful sandy beach Tudumari. No coral or fish, but supposedly they have box jellyfish, but we didn't see any of those either.

Found a nice reef at the shallow Nakano Beach. I like the contrast of the orange sponge with the neon blue fish.

A blue starfish tucked into the coral.

Squid egg cases, each containing hundreds of squid eggs.

Japanese beer. I understand the need for alcohol labeling, but isn't this going a bit too far?

Painted on the wall of the police station. I guess it's supposed to be a mountain cat?

Iriomote: A Walk on the Wild Side of Japan

Iriomote is Japan's wildest island (which isn't saying much). A paved road only goes half way around the island, and there are supposedly no roads into the interior.

We stayed in a budget hostel, where we had to pay $1 an hour for air conditioning. After a sleepless night of doing without, we caved in and got a stack of $1 coins to feed the ac. Although the room was hot, there was a nice breeze from the ocean on the rooftop patio, and we could see owls and big fruit bats flying around at night.

We rented a car from the owner for cheap. When we asked about insurance, he said we didn't need it. I guess there's nothing to hit on the island. Anyway, it's pretty laid back there.

Next to the hostel, there were these pineapples set out on someone's front porch. These mini pineapples are grown on the island, incredibly tasty and only 50 cents each.

Tiger Heron in our back yard.

The big thing to do there is to take a boat ride up the river through the national park and hike to a couple of waterfalls.

The family was really excited to be along for the ride.

The river was flanked with dense greenery.

Eventually it gets too rocky for the boat and you have to get out and walk.

We did see a lot of wildlife on the hike, like this tortoise.

This long skinny green lizard was an agile climber.

Buttressed tree roots.

The first set of falls. We really wanted to jump in the water. 

We saw these neon blue tailed skinks everywhere, sunning themselves along the trail.

This skink wasn't too lucky, but the snake was.

Slurping up the tail like a noodle.

We could actually go down to the second group of waterfalls in the eroded sandstone riverbed.

It was painful looking at all that water in the dizzying heat, but they didn't allow swimming, so all we could do is wade.

Sandstone rock formations. You can hike from here to the other side of the island, and we saw some people doing it. The sandstone was slippery, and I saw them falling down with their huge packs. It didn't look like too much fun, especially in the heat. I thought about doing it as a day hike. Maybe in the winter.

A puddle of tadpoles.

Big spider.

The tide had gone out in the afternoon, and the water was only a foot or so deep in places for the ride back. We had to go really slowly to navigate the narrow channel.

The most famous resident of Iriomote is the little mountain cat, found only on this island. They estimate that there are 99 of these cats. You see images of the cat everywhere on signs. It's a cute little cat, maybe a little bigger than a housecat. At the wildlife center they have one that was injured as a kitten and has lived there for 13 years. They don't let you see it, but they do have a live video feed so that you can watch it on tv. I guess they don't want it to get used to people, so that they can observe the natural behavior of a cat that's been captive in a cage its whole life. At the center they had stuffed cats, skeletal cats, cat tracks, and best of all, cat poo.

  

From observing this natural behavior, researchers have learned fascinating character traits. For example, like most cats, it sleeps most of the time.

After all the hype, we felt lucky to actually see the silhouette of a cat cross the road as we were driving home in the dark. 

The wildlife of Iriomote.