Yutoku Inari Shrine in Kashima City

Ya! Russell finally gets to enjoy one of the tours offered by the base here in Sasebo. I've taken quite a few and this one is going to be extra special because it's his first! Here is a picture of us on the bus together not worrying about how to get there, traffic or how much gas is left in the tank. We just sit back, look out the window and drool over the breathtaking scenery and enjoy each others company.  

Today we took a tour that was not far from Sasebo, but made us feel like we were in entirely different world. This is the Yutoku Inari Shrine in Kashima City. It's the third largest Inari shrine in all of Japan and was about 3 stories high! However, you could climb even further up the side of the steep mountain above it. We did!

This is us in front of the tori gates protecting the shrine entrance way.

This is one of the larger entryways leading up to the actual shrine itself.

As seen in other posts about visiting shrines from our blog, you have to clense your mouth and each hand before entering.  

This is Russell and I praying our new years wish. I'm pretty sure everyone knows what our wish is in this year of the mighty dragon!

Here it is!!!! The big one! That is us and our group of friends that we toured with on this trip in front of the Yutoku Inari Shrine.

They had rows and rows of tori gates leading up the side of the mountain as you got higher and higher into the summit. Really and amazing site to see and walk through!

 

It was a rainy day and very slippery as we made our way up the stairs!

Once you got past the big 3 story shrine there were no more nice even stairs. It turned into a very steep, uneven, old, slippery rock pile. It was pretty much straight down for a good 10 minute hike.

After the shrine, the tour took us to a saki brewery called Happy Princess or in Japanese: Sachi Hime. We got a behind the scenes tour on the process of making saki and then we got all the free tastings we wanted. The photo below is my friend Ema and I "compai"-ing. Also known as Cheersing!  

Hirado City

A few weekends ago Russell and I made our way to find a new city and to explore new things! We heard about a bridge that looked just like the Golden Gate bridge and decided it might be worth checking out. Once we were there we ended up finding many more fun things!

We didn't end up getting a great photo of us, but this one will do just fine.

We found this big toy store!

 

Next thing we found was the Insect Park! Russell was in his little bug heaven!

 

When we went we even got our own tour guide! He spoke pretty decent English. However, when you asked a question about something other then bugs, he didn't know what you were saying.

Looking for bugs!

Our tour guide would go around the outside part and show us a bunch of hidden creatures.

 

We finally made it to the bridge!

Next up was Hirado Castle!

 

Standing at the base of the castle. It doesn't look that big when you get up to it. Although there was a bunch of other buildings around the castle that made it actually be bigger.

 

They let you go outside of the very top of the castle! It was very cold up there but it had an awesome view!

A view of a temple from the top of the castle window. It was beautiful! I would love to see all this on a clear day.

After we were done with the castle we decided to go explore a part of the old city. When we were there we found a shop that sold these desserts that were only made in Hirado (or so we are told). It was a sugary outside with a sweet cake/bean paste middle. It was very yummy for this big sweet toothed lady!

This is the old part of the city. The buildings are very old and very traditional Japanese. All of the doors are sliders and once inside many had the rice paper doors. You can't find many buildings in Japan like this anymore.

In the middle of the city they had a hand and foot hot spring bath for the public to use. Once you put your hands in the piping hot water your skin instantly gets all tight it feels as if you have just put lotion on your hands. It was amazing! We would have put our feet in as well, but we both had big hiking boots on and no towel to dry our toes off once we were finished.

I have to add one more little story that I didn't get pictures of. When we were on our way there our wind shield was very dirty and we desperately needed it to be cleaned off. Well we very seldom get gas out in town (in fact I have yet to do it!) and so we weren't sure how this would work. We pulled into a gas station and man comes running out to help us. Trying our hardest to explain that we needed just to have our windows clean, the man understands and starts cleaning away! I try to get out of the car to help and he says no, no, no...  Once he is finished, we try to pay him 200Y but he shakes his head no once again. We bow very deeply to show our great amount of gratitude. Everyone is so nice in this country! Most people are so willing to help with no expectations of being rewarded for their time and effort. It's amazing!

Football!

Here are a few photos from my flag football game a few weeks ago. It was a very cold, but fun game! I'm number 26 wearing the green hat...


   This was the warm-up before the game. Practice throwing and catching.

And yes. I can throw and catch pretty darn well now.

Most of the time during the games I play center (the one who hikes the ball).

 

 

Sasebo's Fertilitry Shrine

As some of you might know, Russell and I haven't exactly had the easiest time of conceiving a little one. So when we heard there was a shrine here that we could go to and make a few extra wishes and prayers, we thought, why not! Here are some photos that we took along the way on another beautiful mini island with hopefully a very lucky shrine on it!


This is the front of the shrine. There is a little station on the right of this building where I had to cleanse my hands in the water and then enter the shrine. I went in and bought a charm for fertility. I was told by one of my Japanese friends that I need to hold this with me all the time. I carry it in my pocket or in my purse. We learned in indoc class when we first got here that we could also make a wish.

Since I had to do the hard part (see photos below) Russell decided he would be the one to make a wish for us. You throw a 100 yen coin into that box in front of Russell. You then bow, ring the bell (as he is doing in the second photo), make a wish and then bow again.

In front of the shrine was this little tori gate. I'm sure most of you have seen these and know that they are very important to Japanese culture. Well this one is a mini one. And as the story goes, after you buy your charm from the monks (as stated above), you then have to crawl through this gate 3 times in order for your wish to come true. Once your wish does come true, you are to return to the shrine and give thanks to the monks for praying for you and helping you.

So here it goes! Thank goodness I fit and as you can see, it was a close one!

 

I did this three times.

We then looked around the shrine area and came across this statue of a god or other person of importance I'm guessing. We weren't sure exactly what was going on, but we did see children's drinks, yen and toys around the shrine. Just to cover ourselves and give us the best luck we possibly could, we put three pieces of yen on top of the toy monster trucks.  

This is one of the Okinawan protector dogs that you find in front of the shrines here. Russell even got me a pair from Okinawa to put in front of our front door at home. It is supposed to ward off bad spirits.

This was the larger tori gate decorated for New Years down the hill from the actual shrine itself.  You will see these EVERYWHERE here in Japan.

 

After we were finished with the shrine we decided to look around the mini island a little more. We found a trail and decided to take it! This is where it lead us. Onto a cool looking path with more mysterious protector shrine looking items and amazing views of the 99 Islands National Park.

 

Well on top was an amazing view!!! Look at the color of this water in this cove! It was like a bright teal/green and I just couldn't get over how amazing it looked! OH and this this is where the shrine was, its directly in the middle of that peninsula in the middle of the photo.

This was us on top of the mysterious island. An amazing view!

 

After we came off the islands it was low tied in the bay and the ground was covered in oysters and other shell looking things. These two older ladies were down their picking at them and I would even think that its that nights dinner! Maybe. Anyhow, we walked by them and we said "Konichiwa." They said it back and then muttered something else. I know very very little Japanese, but I could make out a few words. One word was "genki" and another was "ka." Which usually in a sentence means in English translation, "How are you?" "Ka" is actually how they end a sentence in a question. After a few seconds and putting two and two together in my head, I responded with, "Hai, Genki!" Which translates into "Yes, Good/Fine." Haha... I laughed at myself because I had no clue if she had indeed asked how I was. She humbly giggled back and that made Russell and I smile. We then went on our way.  

Once we reached our car again, Russell did his normal and opened the car door for me and gave me a kiss. Once we shut the door he walked over to some wild flowers and picked a few for me. I could see what he was doing so I whipped out the camera and actually got this adorable candid photo of him. He is so good to me and constantly makes me smile.

New Years Eve= Awesome Adventure

Russell and I decided that we wanted to get out of town and do some exploring around our island, Kyushu. We had nothing to do on New Years eve and thought this would make for a perfect opportunity to go out and explore things we have yet to see and do. I knew the way to head towards the coast. Sasebo is located and surrounded by a bay and we hardly ever see the actual sea or ocean. If you know Russell, he practically lives in the water and is in it every chance we he gets. We headed south west and ended up finding this beautiful little set of islands, the biggest one being about the size of Coronado. I was in heaven because this island reminded me of it.

 SaiKai is known for lobster! Ya for us and it being a holiday so we could splurge on a nice New Years meal. They signs for it everywhere as well as all different kinds of fish! Here are a few pictures of our exploration trip!



You have to first drive across this bridge to get to the first island.

Driving across it! Beautiful!

Russell poking at something in the water as we were exploring the tide pools.

Under the bridge! I loved every minute of this trip!

The view from the lookout point at the bottom of the bridge. Isn't gorgeous? I felt like we were in Hawaii!

They had huge maps of the islands all over the sides of the roads so you wouldn't get lost.  

We then ran into this very nice looking resort and onsen (Japanese bath house). It was on the very end of a peninsula and had 360 degree views! They also had a restaurant inside and we wanted to eat there, but they were sold out because of the holiday. We decided to explore the grounds of the resort instead.

They had a lookout point that you could walk up onto and this me hanging out there!

Russell was in love with all these beaches and can't wait for summer so we can go exploring in all of them.

These creatures are everywhere! Not only at this resort, but I see them on peoples door steps around our neighborhood. I need to ask some of my Japanese friends on what they mean and what exactly they are.

The straight down view from the look out point! Look how pretty the water is!

After we were done there we decided to stop off at this restaurant. We figured they had to have lobster!

We knew we had ordered the right thing when the man came out, took a lobster from the tank next to us and then came over to the table to make sure this one was okay for them to cook!!!!!!

When the man brought the lobster out to us, the large tentacle got caught up on my sweater. This was my face of excitement. NOT! lol. Thank goodness I was half way done with my beer at this point. lol.

Our entire meal consisted of half of our lobster steamed and put into miso soup. That was delicious! The second half of our lobster was sashimi. Aka: raw!!!! Yep! It's legs and tentacles were even still moving on our plates!!!! Yes, I did try a few bites of it and it actually didn't have much taste to it. It definitely didn't taste fishy, just kinda there. I could even see my dad trying this. It also came with bowls of rice for each of us, some pickled veggies and some fish flakes. I'm not going to lie, Russell ate 65% of this meal. It was a great experience and I wouldn't change it for the world! We decided we are definitely coming back to visit it again.