Off to play in Princess Mononoke's Woods (Part 1)

(Outside our bed and breakfast)

I'll take some time to write a summer travel log in this dreary winter weather.
Back in September, I finally had a chance to visit a place I've been wanting to go to for a very long time. If you have had the chance to see Hayao Miyazaki's "Princess Mononoke" You might remember the beautiful forests that the Kodama's, Princess Mononoke (San) and Wolves resided in. The forest in fact, is based off an ancient forest in Yakushima (屋久島）, an island off Kagoshima prefecture (鹿児島県) - and is said to rain almost constantly. Yes, after seeing the movie when it first came out, I have wanted to go to Yakushima.

(Navigation is simple in Yakushima)

Being the last trip big trip before my life as a salaryman, I wanted this trip to be epic and epic it was, in good ways and bad. Booking our ticket at H.I.S and with a group of some of my closest friends, we headed for Kagoshima by air. From Kagoshima, we stopped for a delicious sushi lunch before boarding a hydrofoil to Yakushima island. Initially, things did not look good. A typhoon had just passed and the waves were rocky at best. However, when we approached the island, the weather began to clear and we were welcomed to Yakushima by blue skies, clear oceans and misty mountains. Checking in to our bread and breakfast, we decided to rent a car to explore the island. Being a circular island, navigation through Yakushima is not really an issue. Starting from Miyanoura (宮之浦) we headed west to begin our journey. Coming across a white sand beach with crystal clear waters after no more than 10 minutes of driving boded well for the remainder of the journey; some silliness in the water and sand later, we headed towards Nagata (永田), a beach famous for its sea turtle nesting sites.

(Nagata beach)

It was there that disaster struck.

Since the typhoon had just passed, the waves were a little choppy, we decided to take a group picture when the my wallet fell into the ocean! Taking off my shorts and leaving them on the beach, I dove in after my wallet - managed to recover everything, except for 900 dollars in cash!! A truly FML moment. To add insult to injury, a big wave rolled in around the same time, swallowing my my cell phone AND pants into the afternoon swell.

Fantastic.

So basically, after swimming in the ocean frantically collecting the banknotes that were floating around in the waves, I was left without pants, 900 dollars and cellphone. Riding back to the bed and breakfast in nothing but boxers, a state of shock and a very large donation to the ruler of the seas we settled in for dinner, a delicious combination of pork dishes, bitter gourd, sashimi and and a whole deep-fried flying fish. After the beach ordeal, beer had never tasted so good.

(Deep-fried Flying Fish)

That was just day one.