The ferry terminal turned out to be a mere 10-minute walk from the hostel, quite convenient. On the way I stopped at the Family Mart to get sandwiches for breakfast. On the shelves I saw a tacos 巻きずし, and tacos rice packed in a paper box (like one of those
Chinese takeaways boxes you see on American dramas). Perhaps it's all because of the US influence on the island, otherwise I can't think of a reason why people love tacos so much to the extent of making such variations!
The ferry was 70 minutes long. There was a fast ferry that departed an hour earlier, but obviously that's more expensive so we took the slow one.There were very few people on the island (apparently the island's population is 730 - but we saw much less!) when we arrived at the ferry terminal. There's a minibus service to アハレンビーチ (Aharen beach - one of the two main beaches), which was only 10 minutes long but cost everyone 400 yen one-way - a rip-off really!
But - oh my God - Aharen beach was simply amazing! I was utterly speechless. The colours of the sea were the most jaw-droppingly beautiful shades of blue turqoise I had ever seen.
We went to grab some lunch at a nearby restaurant before changing into swimming suits and running down to the beach. The water was quite cold though, but that didn't put us off. Larisa and I had a fun time swimming in the sea and taking photos together.
Something annoying, strange and
a little funny happened on the beach. There were only a handful of tourist so we weren't worried about our belongings at all, we just left them somewhere open on the beach and went swimming. Then at one point when we returned to our bags, we realised 'someone' had tried to go through our belongings. The water bottles were lying on the sand; my jacket, which originally stuffed my half-opened backpack, was covered in sand on the beach; and Larisa's paper bag was torned apart.It was weird 'cause there weren't anyone suspicious around and we didn't lose anything. Later we realised, as we looked up to the sky, it was the crows! They tried to search for food in our bags!
On the way back to Naha we took the slow ferry again. There are 2 decks on the ferry. The top one has the usual seating, and the lower one has 2 rooms with raised, carpeted floors where passengers can just lie down. It was quite nice, actually, to lie down and take a quick nap (or watch sumo on TV) to pass that 70-minute journey. We didn't spend that much time at the beach, but there was that exhaustion everyone feels after having been to the beach.
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