Ishigaki is actually a prefecture of Okinawa. This was our last Japan stop before returning to Kobe at the end of our cruise. The ship was at Ishagaki from 9 am until 6 pm. We had booked a 6.5 hour "Best of Ishigaki '' excursion that started at 9:30 am and that was pretty much our entire day in Ishigaki.
Our tour started with a half hour drive to the Tamatorizaki Observation Platform. It was a beautiful day with a dark blue sky and white fluffy clouds
Next our tour took us to a stop where we could see both Yonehara Beach and Yoneko Yaki Kobo Shisa Farm. Yonehara Beach looked to have some great snorkeling and it was a great day for it!
It would have been fun to spend the day at Yonehara snorkeling. However, that wasn't part of our tour and, besides not being dressed for it nor having enough time to go snorkeling, we wanted to also see the funky artwork at Yoneko Yaki Kobo Shisa Farm. The "farm" (more of an outdoor art gallery) was just an easy walk across the road from Yonehara Beach.
In addition to having a craft store where smaller items were available, and of course could be shipped back home for you, there was a large outside area displaying larger than human sized versions of similar funky artwork. They all look like hallucinations from a psychedelic trip! A good trip in most cases.
Our next stop was at the Kabira Park Observation Deck. This location is another great spot for snorkeling as well as jumping off point for scuba diving and tour boats. It seemed to be one of the busier and more hectic stops on our tour with lots of people and boats coming and going.
By then it was well past time for lunch and so we headed to the Shabu-shabu restaurant for a hot pot lunch - though it was large enough for us to be considered dinner. Don't have any pictures of the delicious lunch as I was, once again, too busy eating to take pictures.
After lunch we headed to the last stop of the day, the Emerald Sea Observatory Deck. It was definitely the high point of the day, both literally and figuratively. We could even see our ship.
Although I don't have any pictures of it I'm sure we had some musical send off from Ishigaki. But after the long day and big late lunch I was probably too tired to take any pictures or videos of it.
Click this link or one of the pictures above to see more pictures in the Ishigaki photo album
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