Travelog for: Bally

Hi!

Today we had a party! A small Halloween party. We had to have it today as Paula is leaving but didn't want to miss out on the fun.
Sam found some costumes for us and decorated the table for us.

Here we are in costume.
Bellatrix the mermaid. Jonas the jester. Me the wizard. Paula the princess. Chester the superhero. Don't we look great?!?!



And here we are eating donuts. We danced to spooky music and had alot of fun.



I'm sleepy now, i will write more soon.
Hugs, Bally.

I am finally back home with my mom.  I had fun in OZ but I did not get any updates through all the fun holidays and my mom was frantic I was lost!!! I am going to go visit Jayme in Okinawa, Japan!! I cant wait!! Im getting my bags packed right now and getting ready to leave.

I've arrived safe and sound in Okinawa, Japan! Thankfully Jayme stopped to check the mail on her way out to the zoo, so I hit the ground running so to speak. From the post office we headed to the Okinawa Zoo. Here we are at the entrance.


Its a very small zoo, but they do have some fun animals. Our first stop was to see the monkeys!


They also had an anteater


The hippos were out of the water and pacing because it was almost feeding time.


All the trees here are labeled and Jayme says this one makes her smile a bit


They had already put the food out for the giraffes


The alligator was chilling


Inside the zoo is the best part, what's called the Children's Wonder Museum. Its also rather small, but it has some fun things to do inside. Check out this giant chair!


They also had different size eggs you could climb into


They had lots of hands on things for the kids. This part is a ball rolling game.


Write more soon,
Bally

Today we got to go to one of the special castles on island. Its an UNESCO site that happens to be close to Jayme's home. Its called Zakimi Castle.


It is one of the castles on island left from the Ryukyu Kingdom. Its just ruins now, but after the Battle of Okinawa during WWII there isn't much left, even in some of the ruins. This castle was a bit further to the north of the island which is part of the reason its still relatively well preserved.

First we had to walk up a pathway


And here's the first gate to the castle


We kept walking in to the very top. From the top you could see water in every direction! Okinawa is a very small island, and all the castles are situated in high areas for protection. Zakimi like many others offers a wonderful view.


And here I am looking down into the courtyard area from the top wall


They had a small area here were you leave coins for good luck.


On our way home we stopped to do something fun for the kids. Isn't this slide HUGE?


Here I am at the very top! You can see its a roller slide. The adults usually sit on a piece of cardboard to go down otherwise they really start to burn on the way down since it goes so fast! The younger kids ride on their laps and the older kids go down in a crouched position on their feet so their shoes protect. I got to ride with Jayme and her son.


That's all for now! Hopefully we'll get to go somewhere else cool soon! Jayme also promised to show me more of her home, we've been out and about so much that I haven't had much rest time.

More soon,
Bally

Mommy,
This past weekend we tried very hard to go see some cherry blossoms! We heard they were blooming on the North end of the island and very much wanted to see them! So we went to Shurijo Castle. Shurijo Castle was the main castle of the Ryukyan Dynasty on the Ryukyan Island Chain. Okinawa is the main island in this chain. It was only recently (in the late 1800's) aquired as part of Japan, and so they still hold many of their own traditions.
Here is the Shurie-mon Gate, the main entrance. It is a ceremonial gate.

This is the gate through the first of the castle walls. Do you see that lion-dog to the right? It is called a Shisa. You will see them in lots of photos out here, they're all over! They're actually originally a bit of a Chinese tradition. Now, they're considered guardian dogs of Okinawa and can be found on almost all homes, businesses, etc. They are usually found in pairs, one male one female. The female her mouth open to allow the good spirits in and the male has his mouth closed to capture the bad spirits.

We found some flowers!


And here are the cherry trees. Those are pretty pitiful blossoms.


We walked a little further up through another gate. This one leads into the castle proper.

Here's a view looking down.

But oh no! They were restoring and painting the castle so we couldn't get any good pictures! Silly them doing it during cherry blossom season! Here's a picture of what the castle looks like when its not covered in scaffolding and plastic and such.

We walked some more around the grounds, this is one of the shrines on site. isn't it pretty set out on the pond? On the other side of it is a walkway to get down to it.

Jayme said we were going to try to go back to Shurijo Castle this weekend. We'll have to cross our fingers that there's more cherry blossoms and less scaffolding!

More soon,
Bally

Mommy,
Today we went on a nice long walk. Jayme says she hasn't been exercising enough and wanted to get out of the house while the weather was cooperating. Here's the view from our walk.


When we got closer I could see the sea wall a little better. There's lots of graffiti on it. Jayme says all the sea walls here are like that. Many are in Japanese, but english people also write messages on them and some of it is very pretty.


We kept walking and found this neat dolphin statue along the way


I also got to get a closer look at the sea wall. Most of Okinawa is surrounded by seawall to protect against erosion


Look how big these pieces are!


We kept walking and found a sign along the way.


It was near this beach, Jayme said its called sunset beach and is very popular during the summer.


There was a neat seahorse there as well.


Also along this walk was Araha Beach, another very popular place during the summer. Do you see those nets? They're to keep out jelly fish. Most of the swimming beaches have them.


We stopped at Araha beach to let the kids play on the ship playground, but found out it was roped off. Apparently they're fixing it up during the winter.


But there was another, smaller boat nearby to play on.


I played with the kids for a little while, then decided to sit down and rest. It was a long walk!


More soon!
Bally

Dear Mommy,
Resi, Chipper, and Argoyle arrived from Australia today! They had some fun stories.

Jayme told us first off we needed to do some work in the children's room while they were asleep. We were going to rearrange some shelves and put up a toy net for the stuffed animals. Look at these poor pitiful stuffed animals, they need a better home!

First we moved one of the beds and the shelves over next to it. Jayme moved the furniture, but we took care of the cars.

Then Jayme put up the toy net. We got to rest and relax in it for awhile.

Then we tried to hurry the toys into the net.

Wait a second! The little ones are going to get squished. Big ones first!

Okay now little ones! Whoa, we almost ran out of room.


Hiding in the toys we found a toyvoyager! She explained her name was ChiChi and she was supposed to be released into the wild ages ago, but Jayme's son had hid her in the other toys and she'd been patiently waiting. Hopefully we can help her get released.

After setting up the toy net we were very hungry so we went to make dinner. First we got the meet cooking with onions, garlic, and teriyaki sauce.

In the mean time we got some beans, brocolli and lettuce chopped up in and in a bowl.

Then we combined it all and let it cook.

Served with brown rice it was very yummy!

Jayme said we'd need the energy, hope we have some more updates soon!

More soon,
Bally

Mommy,
I know I'm in Japan, but today we visited a Chinese garden. It was quite pretty. First we had to stop for just a quick lunch since we were all hungry.

They had this very pretty building where we walked in.

And aren't these dragons neat?

There were LOTS of little ponds.

Of course we had to stop and feed the fish, Jayme's children wouldn't calm down until we did!

Isn't this view pretty?

They had lots of little statues around as well.

Here's another pond...

They had this statue here, we're not sure of who it is though.

We stopped to take a break for awhile...

And they even had a waterfall!


More soon,
Bally

Dear Mommy,
Today we went back to Shurijo Castle to try to see the cherry blossoms, but they didn't look much different from the week before. Apparently the wind and rain has been knocking them all off Since we were here we decided to look at more of the castle. Here's the back entrance marker.

We walked up a small hill and found the back gate

The picture I showed you the other day was from the inner courtyard, this is how the outside of the castle looks when not under scaffolding! Unfortunately the inside was still covered in plastic.

They did have a neat emperor and emperess out here though.

And here's a view of Naha from Shuri Castle

We had to stop to use the bathroom, and look at the faucets!


And here you can see more shisa from the guest services area.

Write more soon,
Bally

Dear Mommy,
We got to watch the superbowl! It's a bit different when you watch it overseas. First off, it starts at 8am so we had cinnamon rolls instead of 'normal' snacks.

There was also no commercials out here. Because it's carried on AFN, they can't show commercials. Jayme had some small jerseys she got from burger king that fit Resi and Chipper. Aren't they cute?

Then we settled in to watch the opening ceremonies.


The coin toss

And onto the game!


And the Steelers won! And we got to have some more appropriate food for lunch...

Chipper was a bit disappointed, so we decided to go on a walk to cheer him up. We went to one of the local parks. We found a funny bear along the way.

While the kids were at the playground I hung around up in a tree to relax.

This park has many stadiums and buildings for sporting events.

We took a little break on this bench

We were trying to figure out what this statue meant. There wasn't a sign in english, but Jayme thinks its a Phoenix.


More soon,
Bally

Dear Mommy,
Jayme's been quite busy studying (school has started for her) so we decided to pitch in and help a bit. She gave us instructions on how to make what she called Jayme-version-Enchiladas and we got to work.
We browned the meat on the stovetop with onions and garlic and then added some enchilada sauce and a little cheese.

Then we put it into tortilla shells

We rolled them up

And put more sauce and some cheese on top

Then we put them in the oven to cook. While they were cooking we made some cheese quesadillas for the children. We put some cheese in tortilla shells

And put them in a little oil on the stove top to cook

Yum! All done.

And the enchiladas are done too!

Jayme says we have a special trip planned tomorrow, I hope its fun! Write more soon,
Bally

Jayme said today we're headed to the Churaumi Aquarium. Apparently its very famous, and one of the largest attractions on Okinawa. It was a very long drive up north but we made it! Here is the view from the aquarium entrance to the ocean below, isn't it beautiful?

We went in to find the largest coral tank in the world that is lit by sunlight. Wow! Here it is.

And here's some more.

These are clown fish, but they must be just babies because they weren't longer than half a pinky.

Finally we got to the main show piece, the whale shark tank. It was the largest in the world until the one in Atlanta was completed, now its the second largest. However, it still has the largest viewing glass in the world. We were sitting way up high in the seats available, do you see the whale shark?

Here's a better picture, and you can see the people below looking at it. They're right up next to the glass.

While we were there there were diver's in the tank cleaning, you can see how big they are compared to the mantas in the tank.

After watching for awhile at the viewing area, we went into the cafe. Here they have seats right next to the tank and you can sit and eat lunch or enjoy some icecream. I know its dark (the flash would ruin the view of the tank!) but here I am having icecream.

Even after we finished the icecream we just sat and watched the fish for awhile.

After seeing the whale sharks we headed outside. They had sea turtles you could see out here!

There is a drop off behind us that is the sea turtle nesting area. Isn't it beautiful here? The water was so clear, and the sun so bright!

Then we went to the dolphin show! Here I am at it.

Jayme had to zoom in to take these pictures of the show, aren't the dolphins cool? They had a few different types, unforutnately Jayme doesn't know their names since she doesn't understand much Japanese.


We took a walk along the grounds then. Here's a pretty spot we found with a little pond.

We also found a gate into the Okinawan Village, but Jayme's sons were getting very tired then so it was time to head home.

On the way we got to see some of the flowers made up to be sea creatures! Here's a manta ray.

And a turtle.

And isn't this a cool shisa?


I'm sure we'll have more adventures soon!
Bally

Dear Mommy,
I'm sorry I didn't write you sooner! It's been very busy here. First I'll start with telling you about Valentine's Day. We were sitting around reading more about Okinawa

Then Jayme asked us for some help! She had to get valentine's ready for Jacob's class. So we went to work. What a mess..

There are six children in the class, so we split everything up into groups of six

Then we bagged them up and tied them and attached the card! Do you notice something?

The hearts didn't fit so we got a bit of a snack! Yum!

And look, isn't that cute? Chipper got Resi flowers for Valentine's Day!

We had lots more adventures, so I'll write more soon!
Bally

Dear Mommy,
Jayme and her husband said we could go out on their Valentine's Date with them! They were supposed to go snorkeling, but because the weather wasn't nice they decided to go ice skating instead. First we had to read the rules

Then we had to wait, we got there just as they were cleaning the ice.

Wow! Look at all those people! It was very busy because of the rain, but Jayme and her husband had lots of fun while we watched.

We rode with Jayme for a bit, but she got tired first so we all sat down to wait for her husband.

Then we went out for a late lunch. This is called Taco Rice. Its one of the odd foods Okinawans came up with to pull in American service members to eat. Its white rice on the bottom with taco meat, cheese, lettuce, and tomatoes. It was very yummy!

Write more soon,
Bally

Dear Mommy,
The weather has been very icky! We got a brief period of just gloom today and decided we needed to get out of the house a bit. We went to a place called Ryukyu Mura. Here I am at the entrance.

And here is a pretty building on a raft in the water, I know you can't see the water and stuff too well

The biggest part of Ryukyu Mura is the parade showcasing small bits of typical Okinawan parades. First the emperor and emperess come out to sit down to watch the show.

Then this karate dude came out. Did you know karate was invented on Okinawa?

Next came the old man and the dragon. They made the dragon do tricks catching a ball!


Then came the Eisa Dancers. Eisa is a drum dance done on Okinawa, its very pretty.


Finally some people came out and did another dance, Jayme wasn't sure who they were. And they got the crowd to join in! It was such fun.


After that we went up a path to a place where we got to learn about Habus. Unfortunately it was very dark and the pictures didn't really come out. We did get to watch a 3D show of a Habu fighting a mongoose though.

We walked back through a small version of an Okinawan village where they were selling Okinawan crafts, but we had to hurry it looked like rain!


We ducked into one building near the exit to find out it was where they made Okinawan pottery. Look at all those tables and clay!

Here are some Shisa on the outside that were made inside.

There was also a man outside pushing an water buffalo around, but we're not quite sure why.

I hope you enjoyed learning about our visit! I'll write again soon,
Bally