Yomitan and Manzamo

Friday night we went to dinner at a new izakaya that has opened up about 2 minutes walk from our place in Nakadomari and it was delicious! The drink driving limit in Okinawa is basically zero so this was the first time we got to go out for a meal and both have a drink. They had a decent amount of vegetarian options for Helen and some "super melt in my mouth" tuna sashimi for me. I envision many a night eating out at this local in the future.

Tuna Sashimi

Saturday we ventured to Yomitan, the next town south of Onna to check out the pottery village and Cape Zanpa. The pottery village was cute, but not the best with a toddler if you want to relax and check out all the shops and galleries. Still, I bought a pair of mugs and a cute little vase.

Yomitan pottery village - Yachimun no Sato

The building was full of kilns

Cape Zanpa was much more Griffin friendly, considering there was a lighthouse that we could climb to the top of for only 200 yen! Griffin loves lighthouses and he loved actually getting to climb to the top of one. The weather was windy and a little rainy, but we made it to the top and got to see the amazing, almost black water surrounding the Cape. The water was so dark compared to what we see from our house it was almost scary. I felt like, if you fell in there, it would swallow you and you would never escape. We will definitely go back though in warmer weather because we drove past a gorgeous looking beach on the way there.

Zanpa lighthouse

View of the black water from the top of the lighthouse

After the lighthouse we were starving and finally got to try Dechibica, a little cafe I had read about on numerous sites and it didn't disappoint. It's mostly vegetarian and vegan (apart from a couple of chicken curries) and delicious. We will be back.

Curry set from Dechibica

Sunday the weather showed signs of sun for the first time in what seems like forever, so we ventured out in search of a playground in Onna that a colleague had told me about and it was fantastic. It was huge and Griff loved it! It also had a little grass field next to it for our puppy to run around in. It was the first time our dog has had a good run on grass since we got here and he LOVED it. I can see us spending a lot of time there. 

Onna playground

Ollie enjoying the grass

After the playground we wanted to make a quick stop at Cape Manzamo as it was right there. It was very crowded, but the weather and the view was beautiful. I think it's probably best to get there early in the morning to avoid the wait for a car park, but at 11am it only took about 10 minutes for us to get a park and it was worth it.

Manzamo

Amazing blue waters

It felt great to spend our first weekend being tourists in Okinawa rather than constantly at shopping malls trying to find much needed supplies. I look forward to many more weekends like this one.