Icho Park, Hotokegaura, and Osorezan with Richy and Kari

My awesome and amazing brother and sister in law booked some tickets to Japan when prices were below $600 each round trip and we were so excited when June 23 finally came and we got to pick them up!

They rode the overnight bus up to Misawa from Tokyo and we picked them up near the Shimoda mall around 7:30 am.  The problem was that the power was out at our apartment for the whole morning, so we had to take them on their first adventure right away.  First stop: Icho Park!

Richy and Kari got a kick out of the roller slide.  Although they weren't sure it was too comfortable!

The kids love the playground.

Two of my favorites.

Uncle Richy convinced everyone to walk around the lake/pond at the park.  Can you see the Statue of Liberty in the distance?

Lily pads were in bloom!  I think this was a first for me!

My kids love for me to take pictures of bugs.

Watching the tadpoles.

When we finally got home, the travelers crashed before we took them on our next big adventure!

Once Ethan was done with work that day we hit the road to the north-west coast of Honshu, what is referred to as the Hatchet.  We reserved this cool cabin for the night.

Its pretty cool to see how the people here live/travel.  Richy felt kind of tall.

The kitchen.

Some of the beds... the mattresses are futon pads that are folded up in the closets that we pulled out and onto the beds.

The view from upstairs.

Again, the travelers crashed.  Jet lag is a real thing.

The next morning we went out to explore the area outside our cabin.

The beach was covered in garbage and I didn't feel like hiking down to it... but a friend just was at the same place and she was rewarded with some awesome treasure for her hunt down in this mess.

The cliffs are beautiful, though.

Levi wanted to find the shrine that this torii gate led to... but I guess we took a wrong turn up the trail because we never found it.  Richy said he did and he spent some time doing yoga at the peak.

Levi and I ended up on the other side of the cliff.

After breakfast and cleaning up we headed out toward the main event, Hotokegaura, the white cliffs.  It started with a little hike down.

I was a little worried about all these stairs we were going to have to come back up.

But we made it!

And we were not disappointed.

A great family photo if we'd all been there... Jonas and Bryant were still at scout camp at this point.

 

 

Mesmerized by the sea stars.

Climbing the rocks.

We spent a lot of time exploring the tide pools.  Richy and Ethan found some huge sea cucumbers.

These two boys spent a lot of time chasing their dad and big brother...trying to keep up is hard work!

A cool, tiny sea star.

Eliza and Bolton had lots of fun climbing up this steep hill... good thing there was  rope!

After exploring the pools, we ventured to the opposite side of the cliffs to find more cool rock formations.

They are pretty big!

On our walk over the boardwalk, Abe tripped and fell hard on his face, the Japanese tourists who had just arrived on the ferry were all very worried about him.  One even found a band-aid for him... kind of hard to place, though.

A small shrine at the beach.

After the long walk back up the stairs we hit the road toward Osorezan, aka the Gates of Hell.  It is ranked as one of the three most sacred mountains in Japan.

So many Buddhas.

The washing ritual before entering the temple.

It is a stark contrast to the lush green mountainside surrounding this volcanic area.

There are so many pools in this area.  But the water is full of sulfur (among other things).

I didn't see what this statue was at first, but its a turtle with tiny turtles on its back.  Really cool looking.

I can't easily remember all the details regarding the significance of the temple and statues, but check out the link if it interests you!

We were hoping to head to the lighthouse and see the wild horses as well, but we ended up missing it because of time (the gate closes at 4pm).  Plus we needed to get home to be sure to be there when our scouts got home!  It was a very cool and fun way to spend the day!