Hello from New York! I was a little reluctant to leave Japan so soon, but the weather in NY is absolutely gorgeous, so I’ll take it. (I’ve been up since 3:30 this morning, so I got to see the beautiful morning light hit the buildings outside our window.) I also didn’t bring any knitting on the Japan trip, so I’m looking forward to picking up the needles after two weeks without.
I just finished downloading the last of my photos, and I realized I took more pics of Okinawa than I thought. So this will be the non-hermit crab Okinawa post.
First, something cute (of course!). An ad for Okinawan “snow salt” cookies at the Naha airport on the main island. (They’re really yummy.)
Iriomote-jima, where we stayed for three nights, has more than just beaches and crabs. It’s also known for its dense jungle and waterfalls. It’s not known so much for its goats, but this one was roaming around just looking to get into trouble.
John was careful not to touch him, so that he could avoid a customs nightmare when returning to the states. (It ended up being a nightmare anyway, but that’s another and not very interesting story.)
And here we have some mangrove roots.
Iriomote-jima was covered with dense mangrove forests, and the guide on the boat tour we took discussed the main three types of mangrove trees in detail, on and on, throughout the 25-minute trip. I now feel like I know all there is to know about mangroves, but only in Japanese.
After our boat tour, we took an hour-long hike to see a waterfall (sans tour guide, thankfully). On the way, I spotted this gorgeous bark.
I don’t recall what kind of tree it belongs to, but I loved its pattern.
Also this cool unfurling vine.
Here’s a shot of the waterfall we hiked to, plus a funny crow who was very interested in us.
And lastly, I found this ad at the airport at Ishigaki-jima to be pretty fascinating.
Never mind the fresh water gushing down the pristine waterfalls of a nearby island, give me the water of America! I have a feeling that this particular campaign wouldn’t do so well in its place of supposed origin.
The majority of my remaining pictures from Japan are of cute ads I found, so I’ll be posting those soon too.
I can see trying to duplicate that tree bark in a knitting pattern! It’s amazing! The green unfurling “thing” looks a lot like a fiddlehead fern. They’ll be opening around here anytime and we love to saute them with a bit of garlic. :O) I’ve enjoyed your posts from Japan. I don’t understand the goat/customs nightmare connection, though.
The customs form you have to fill out when you get back to the United States asks, among other things, if you have been on a farm or near any livestock. (Presumably this is because they want to keep out diseases like foot-and-mouth, mad cow, etc.) If you check “Yes” to any of the questions on the form, you will be forced through Homeland Security bureaucracy hell. So I checked “No,” but I thought of this goat when I did and felt a little guilty for kind of fibbing.
You can eat that fern?? That’s so cool! I wonder what sauteed fern is like…
John,
I’m so glad you cleared that up. The Goat/Customs thing had my mind boggled. It is a cute goat though.
The bark pattern would make a beautiful knitting pattern. I wonder if it would work with socks.
That tree bark looks like a lace knitting pattern just dying to be made!
i think those curling vines are called fiddleheads! they are also edible too!
That bark pattern looks like lots of little lizard faces… or is it just me?
Wait – do the snow salt cookies COME WITH the googly-eyes? Or is that just for the ad?! That is too funny.
I don’t know how John could resist that goat – she is totally giving him the come hhhhhhhhither look.
And Rosa, it’s just you. That bark looks like a bunch of alien faces. Purty frickin cool.