Q4 2006 part 2 Amami and Okinawa

 When we left the Goto Retto it wasn’t for Yakushima, as we had planned. The winds had been blowing steadily from the NE for a while and that left the only suitable anchorage quite exposed. Yakushima is higher then any mountain on Kyushu and the forest is supposed to be quite spectacular with huge, zillion years old cedar trees and we’d been looking forward to some good hikes.

Ah well, we can come back and it doesn’t look like this island will go very far……

So we made a bit of a jump to Amami Oshima, south of Kyushu. For many years I had been dreaming of this place, my favorite island of Japan. I even tried to get Seiha’s sacho-san to open an English school and send us there to teach. It was said jokingly, but when we mentioned it again last month, I thought if only I had pushed a bit more…

Back to the sailing: Arakawa –> Amami, 260 miles.

What a great start of that trip: Just after we left, Jaap discovered some stitches on the jib had come undone. We should have turned around to fix it maybe, but we didn’t and then decided not to use that sail at all incase it got worse and so we motor sailed mostly…there was hardly any wind anyway. Apart from that it was a pleasant 3 day trip. The cats were a bit at a loss, their very first night at sea, wondering why we did not all go to sleep at the right times and changing watches was a 12 legged affair…..

On the second day we saw something orange floating in the distance. Not so strange, there is a lot of garbage in this piece of sea. But it looked kind of nautical and we changed course. And we picked it up, a lifejacket. Thank goodness, no body inside. 

                                           Alishan in Daikuma.

Naze, the main harbor had no place for us, so we turned the corner and tied alongside a concrete wall in Daikuma. The sewing machine came out and we fixed the sail in just an hour. We managed to get a cruising permit for the Kagoshima prefecture using phone and fax. And rode our bicycles for miles into town to look up Ani-san. He used to run the small yacht club, but with the tightening of cruising rules few yachts had ventured in Naze port and he’d changed his hobby to…wild pig hunting. However, he was pleased to see us and we signed the guestbook( second time) – with what looked like might be the last entry.

Ani was busy, but he took us for a drive to my favorite places, the beaches of Amami.

Some local yachties introduced us to Keimeishi, a chicken dish and local music, played on a 3 stringed samisen. We generally spend a lot of time with the locals, because many people love talking to foreigners – in Japanese.

After a few days we hoisted the sails again to move to the southern end of Amami, to the small town Koniya. But again, Alishan with a draft of close to 2m needs space and we had to leave the harbor again. No problem, lots of places to anchor, but it was nearly dark. So we phoned an old acquaintance, Swiss – French Patrick who to our surprise directed us over to his place, on Kakeroma jima, just to the south. And 30 minutes later we had a full swing party onboard with lots of old stories and new stories and plans were made for the next days in this wild island, full of bush and more bush.

 

So we went for drives in a Japanese Jeep 4wd and Marijke got her snorkeling gear out. In the evenings we sat together, talking boats, creating food. One thing we had not counted on was the absence of shops. But a joined ferry-trip to the big city took care of that problem. The black side of Kakeroma Island is the snakes. Deadly poisonous and in big quantities. You better not go anywhere without a big torch at night. They can jump. They are scary! So scary we could not find our running shoes.

  The best thing for Jaap was Patrick and Monica’s bath house, it was filled every night, heated with driftwood and we all took turns.

When Patrick left to sail a boat to Wakayama, we realized we should move on as well.

As soon as the winds looked right we left, this time for Okinawa, 150 mile south.

You won’t believe it, but that is Alishan sailing. Photo taken by Monica: Big Thanks

Okinawa is a very popular holiday destination. It is nicknamed as Japan’s Hawaii.

 Naha, the main city is a real city with shopping malls, restaurants, bars and even a monorail. After getting the ever necessary cruising permit, we left Naha’s big ships harbor, not to go to Gillowan, the island’s main yacht harbor, but to Kadena,  a small pleasure boat harbor used by the USA military. We had more or less been invited by John, an e-mail contact from the time we were selling Jan Haring. As it happened, John was just leaving the island for a holiday… But he left instructions with friends and consequently a whole team of American yachties got up to look after us: They took us out eating, driving, shopping (on the military base, very useful and cheap) washing, you name it. The only thing we managed to do by ourselves was visit the famous Okinawa  aquarium. This aquarium keeps whale sharks ( they are biggg) among all other fish that swims around in the Kuro Shio.

 

Okinawa Aquarium 

The aquarium is part of a sea park and is one of Okinawa’s best places to visit.

We thoroughly enjoyed our time in Okinawa, stayed longer as planned of course, got to meet John and his wife Naomi in the end and made friends whom we sure hope to meet again. Thank you all for your care, Jack, Pam, Greg, Silvia, John, Naomi and others.

Alishan in Kadena.

We had that cruising permit, so we could legally sail to the more remote islands just to the west of Okinawa, the Kerama Retto. At the ministry of Transportation I needed to specify the places we wanted to anchor and because we really had no idea, on the charts anywhere seemed nice, we had given them a list of names, and got permission for all. We left on November the 6^th on what seemed an easy sail of 20 miles, but what turned out to be quite rough, with big steep waves caused by the strong Kuro Shio current against 30 knots of wind. We had not bothered to check the weather report well for such a small body of water and some typhoon, way to the NE of us, sent us strong northerlies.

Once in the Kerama we picked a lovely anchorage between little islands with steep green hills, few roads and houses and clean white beaches. The snorkeling was full on. The dingy was supposed to be our main means of transportation, but the outboard engine didn’t cooperate and so all the exploring was done in the vicinity of Alishan, but hey, this is paradise. Who wants to complain?

On Friday the 9^th we sailed to Zamami, a bigger bay to meet with some Okinawa boats with Jack and Robby and friends for a weekend of more snorkeling and more fun.

This little bugger of a coral block managed to keep us awake half the night, when we dragged anchor for the 3^rd time in the well protected bay of Zamami. It was the first test for our brand new Brucy…passed it with a minus score. For sure we’ll have to get more anchor chain, the Bruce with only 50 meters of chain  isn’t enough for Alishan’s weight.

We miss Jan Haring’s CQR proven anchoring set up. 

 

After 2 more windy days in Zamami, we left for Miyako Jima, an overnight sail.