Castle Ruins and Haunted Hotel

Cliff has "use or lose" leave...so he decided to use some over Spring break...which came in WAY handy with all the driving around we had to do...AND he was able to go spend a night at Girls Camp to provide some of the Priesthood coverage they needed. He did end up having to work a day and a half of his leave, though. (He's over Chaplain training for the island and there was one already scheduled right in the middle of the week...so he was on the hook...grrr!)

Anyway, in spite of all this...and the week's strong penchant for rain...we were determined that some of this leave would actually be used for vacationish purposes.

So, today we went here:


Yes...back to the castle ruins. Patrick had play practice and Coree was still at Girls Camp...but they had already been, anyway. Jake was eager to go, and Troy was at least willing (even though he was really itching to get on his chemistry homework).



We stopped by Family Mart to get a picnic lunch on the way. Jake loves these sushi logs.



Troy enjoys a spaghetti bento with eggs.



And Cliff chose this sushi/taco-rice mashup.



And I enjoyed just watching Cliff...



Mmmm....where was I? Oh yeah...



I had this lovely salad (yes, they put corn on everything here...even pizza), an onigiri with tuna inside and (of course) chocolate sponge cake. (I shared.)



The atmosphere this time was a lot different. There was a huge school group (they were lots of fun to watch)...



And a large tour group as well.



I hadn't noticed this relief map before.



This is how it looked back in the day.



Weird, blurred spot next to Jake's foot on the left side. Could it be?



I didn't go down to the well last time, either...but Jake really wanted to (of course).



Yep. It's water.



A lot of my pictures had these blurred spots today. Hmmm...what do you think? Thumbprints on the camera...or could it be...?!



I just love the plant life on these rocks.



See the blurred spot to the right? I'm just sayin'! ;^)



Best.tour.guide.ever!



The rarely seen photo of the photographer.



Love this bright little guy...wonder what he'll turn into?



There's the haunted hotel in the distance. We'll be getting a closer look later.

Don't know the story? Read a little about it here.


I love this man. Eighteen years, baby!



So Jake takes off ahead of us, and when we catch up, this is what we find...



He's overturned a rock and found a nest of centipedes (enlarge the photo and be amazed).



So here we are, standing just over the edge of the castle ruins site, in front of the haunted hotel. We thought it was off limits, but we noticed the tour group hiking up the hill and figure we'd give it a try ourselves.



I just barely got this shot as these guys sped by. Wish I could have captured it on video so you could hear their squeals, too.

(Trivia: While Japan also has child restraint laws like the US and other countries, they are fairly recent, and on Okinawa, rarely obeyed (at least by the locals). Ignorance is bliss, I suppose...but I don't think I'll ever get used to seeing toddlers climbing on the dashboard or hovering over their parent who is driving the car. Mind blowing.)



Oh, I can tell this place is going to feed my roof fetish already.



Wow, the plant life has really taken over!



Jake is standing in front of one of the ancient burial tombs which made this place haunted to begin with.



Some of this graffiti is amazing. Someone in our party supposed it was the influence of evil spirits on the artists. I supposed it was something the artist ingested. Just sayin'.



Either way...disturbing.



Remember my roof fetish? Maybe I'm the only one who likes this photo...but I really like it!

We survived to post these pictures here. Just the same, you would NEVER catch me here at night. Or on Halloween. Or Friday the 13th. Or after a zombie movie. Wait...I'm not superstitious...and I don't watch zombie movies. But just to be on the safe side...