One of my favourite things to do when travelling (in case it wasn’t obvious) is to go to cafés in the morning. Unfortunately, the combination of cafés here opening a bit later, waking up early, and the town being a small place to begin with, limits the options.
Thanfully there is a small bakery in town about a 15 minute walk from our place. We get ready for the morning and head up the street to Key Bakery. Both the exterior and interior of the bakery are very cute, with a large selection of fresh baked goods. I order a café au lait and a berry pastry while my dad gets a black coffee and sesame bun.
After we’re done, we decided to drtive over to a pineapple winery, which I wanted to try. It turns out, the place is also a pineapple themed amusement park, which for the sake of trying to get a bottle of pineapple wine, proved to be more of an obstacle then anything. Eventually we got the bottle and got back on the road. A quick stop back at the house to drop off the bottle, try a glass (or a mug, in this case), and head back out.
Our next stop was on a smaller island just off the coast of Motobu, with a bridge connecting the two. We make our way to the other side of the island to Emerald beach, an for swimming with jellyfish nets put up around, as they can be one of the bigger threats to swimmers in the waters here. The water was a nice blue and was quite warm for an ocean, though still nice enough to provide an escape from the heat for a bit.
Even from the waters here, you can still see some of the other islands of Okinawa in the distance, and while for this trip we are only on Okinawa island, the largest, it would be fun to see some of the smaller islands in the future as well. Once we’ve sufficiently cooled off, we dry off and hop back in the car.
The trip so far has already had multiple interesting meals comprised of multiple unique dishes to try, and tonight’s no exception. There is an Izakaya about 15 minutes from our place (who’s name I can barely translate) that does some interesting Okinawan food and drinks. Up on the 5th floor of a building by the water, we enter a restaurant with walls of awamori, a regional alcoholic beverage that is a bit similar to sake, though stronger.
As we sit down to order our drinks, we see a chef cutting up a large tuna in front of the tables, using a large knife (bordering on a sword) to seperate the different cuts of meat. I order a peach awamori spritz, as well as a flight of awamori to share with my dad. The different dishes start coming out one at a time. All of the food feels pretty unique to the area, and all of it was quite good.
About halfway through the meal, a sanshin (a 3 stringed Okinawan instrument, similar to a shamisen) player took the stage and started playing. The musician was a ton of fun and played very lively music, taking occasional breaks between songs to cheers and enjoy a beer. The performance and meal went on for another hour or so as our last couple dishes arrived, which were some of the best meals we’ve had so far. It was a very fun experience and a good way to end the day as we trek back in the night to our place.
