25th August, 2007
We headed to an island called Iriomote which was about 40 minutes away by ferry and we took a “Jungle Cruise”. This is the second Japanese tour that I have done in Japan – once again it was hard because of the language barrier but there was this really nice girl who could speak English quite well who was able to help us out. We caught a boat which took us along a river – on either side of the river was greenery – jungle like. Once we got to the end we got out and had to walk about 30 minutes to see a waterfall.
The walk was very scenic with many creatures along the way to look at but at the same time it was very muddy and slippery. We were warned to wear sneakers but as none of us had any with us we had to make to with thongs. We had a few slips and slides and some hurdles to jump but we eventually made it!
After the first waterfall there was a second one about another 15 minutes away. Both waterfalls we beautiful. The whole trip took us about an hour and a half. By the time we got back we were quite muddy so we sat by the river with our feet in the water until the boat came. I really enjoyed the walk.
After the boat ride back it was lunch time. We were in much need of some food as we had just done a lot of hard work. We went to a place where they gave us a bento lunch.
We were then taken to a beach where there is star sand. This is where the sand looks like little stars. It is really cool. We actually were given a little jar with some of the sand in it as a souvenir. We got to have a bit of a paddle in the water with some really cool tropical fish before it was time to move on to the outdoor onsen.
Lauren and I were actually looking forward to this onsen as in this one you could actually wear your bathers!! I had no problems entering the water here :-) It was actually very beautiful as the scenery was like a jungle. It was very relaxing just sitting in the warm water with the jungle as the background. AAAHHHH this is the life!!
We were pretty exhausted after all of this and were glad to be heading back to the ferry to be taken back to our hotel. We ate at a fantastic Thai restaurant where we ate delicious green curry – well I did anyway!
We were leaving Ishigaki today to head back to Naha for our last night. Before we left the island we headed to the beach so that we could have a dip. It was a really nice beach with once again clean water. We had limited time here but it was nice to cool off before we headed back to Naha. 
I was so excited because we had planned to go on a snorkeling tour in the afternoon. This was something that I was really looking forward to. We got geared up with some wet suits and snorkeling masks and hopped on the boat to be taken to the reef. Once again the tour guides were Japanese and had limited English so we had fun trying to work out what was going on. We always seem to manage to get the gist of what is happening. 
The reef was probably not even half an hour away by boat which was good as we were really keen to just get in the water and check out the underwater scene. The water was just glorious. So blue and green and inviting that you just wanted to jump right in. 
We got our wet suits on, put our masks on and we were off. We had about 2 hours of looking at the most amazing reef that I have ever seen. I have snorkeled about 3 times before but have never seen anything like this so for me this was magnificent. The colours in the coral were spectacular. There were many blues and purples which looked stunning. 
The variety of fish I saw was also amazing. I just picked a fish and followed it for ages just watching what it was doing. It was so much fun. Lauren bought an underwater camera and managed to take some cool pictures of what we saw. Of course the photos didn’t do it justice but it is an idea. 
We headed to another island today called Taketomi. This island was only 10 minutes away by ferry which was good. We were only going to spend half a day on this island so we thought the best use of time would be to hire bikes and bike around the island. It was fun to bike around. Our first stop was Kandoi Beach. The water was quite shallow as the tide was out but we still managed to take a quick dip. The water was beautiful. Just the right temperature and crystal clear. You could see everything that was in the water. 
We headed to an island called Iriomote which was about 40 minutes away by ferry and we took a “Jungle Cruise”. This is the second Japanese tour that I have done in Japan – once again it was hard because of the language barrier but there was this really nice girl who could speak English quite well who was able to help us out. We caught a boat which took us along a river – on either side of the river was greenery – jungle like. Once we got to the end we got out and had to walk about 30 minutes to see a waterfall. 
Our hotel was very fancy and nice. We had apparently been upgraded to one of the best rooms in the hotel. It was really nice – probably the best one I have stayed in so far in Japan. Once we dropped our luggage off we put our bathers on straight away and headed to a beach in Naha. Naha isn’t famous for its beaches so we weren’t expecting anything too exciting. We managed to find a small swimming area which wasn’t great to look at but the water was really nice to swim in. Marie and I made the most of it and jumped right in. Lauren decided to just have a laze about on the sand. 
