Birthday Squid x10, Prawn Eating Day and Tuna Carving
The perfect weekend.
We are in Okinawa for my birthday weekend, so we started the day with my favorite activity… snorkeling. Kouri Island at a beach called Tokei Hama was so good yesterday, that we are visiting again today. But first, a quick stop at the Lawson’s for something new, friend Spam. Okinawa feels just like Hawaii sometimes.
Kouri Island at a beach called Tokei Hama
The parking is easy right next to the sandy beach. And the visibility is truly stunning at this site if you’re willing to do the hard work of swimming out. There are choppy waves out here beyond the protection of the inner bay, but it’s a paradise of corals and colorful fish, and no other snorkelers around.
Baby Bear at 9 years old is now a pro in the water and makes the bumpy swim out to the paradise spot. She dives below like a mermaid, inviting me to do mommy and me dives together while holding hands.
Tamaya Prawn Farm
About 10 minutes drive away is a Kurumaebi Kitchen TAMAYA. It is the restaurant of a prawn farm. We dropped by the day before when we saw a sign and drove in to see the farm. But we didn’t stay for food since Papa Bear is not into eating prawns. But I love prawns and after consideration decided we need to “take this U-turn,” and today we are back. Yesterday there was no line at 5 pm, but today there is a solid line at noon. We put our names down on the list and are told to wait in the hot car.
During the wait, we educate ourselves on YouTube videos. The farm has no explanation placards or even a poster. So Papa Bear finds this video by a shrimp expert, and it’s very detailed. Turns out this prawn farm is very special. Somehow seeing the restaurant we are about to visit “on TV” is very exciting.
We learn that these prawns are very hard to farm, but this farm figured out how to do it. Not only that, they can ship the prawns live all over Japan by chilling them slightly.
Almost an hour later, or maybe it was only 30 minutes they call us. For my birthday lunch, I enjoyed prawn 5 ways- sashimi, fried, tempura, boiled and I forgot the last way, but it was more like slightly salt-dried. My favorite is fried. And I learned why these prawns are so special. They are so soft-shelled that in almost every preparation I can eat the entire prawn, shell, and all, up to and including the head. The only part not eaten is the “helmet.” Yes, that’s what Google Translate called it when we translated the Japanese instructions on how to eat the prawn.
I thought that was it for prawn-eating today. But we wrap it up with dinner at Kura Sushi where I find and eat shrimp salad sushi, and my favorite fried tiny shrimp. This completes my Prawn eating day on a very happy note.
Birthday Squid x10
The next day the sea is finally calm enough at our favorite snorkel spot the Gorilla Chop. We checked it every day since they re-opened the parking lot after the typhoon, but it took two more days for the visibility to return. Today we are leaving Okinawa, so luckily we can visit our favorite snorkel spot one last time.
And as the birthday girl, the ocean has a gift prepared for me.
At first, I see only 4 squids, floating just under a lonesome buoy. This buoy is close to where we snorkeled a few times before, but only today did I decide to go take a look there, knowing there are usually good things like tiny convict fish using the buoy as a nursery. I am so ecstatic to find squid swimming under the buoy instead!!
I love swimming with squid so much! They’re pretty rare to find. Of the >100 times I have snorkeled, I have only seen squid 5 times. Bonaire twice, Curacao, Gili Air last year on my birthday, and today. Last year I saw 9 squids, and this year there are 10 in total! Very lucky and what an amazing birthday gift from nature.
Squids are very curious creatures, often staying near and checking me out. They are beautiful because they glimmer and go between being clear to camouflaged against nearby objects. And they are usually a bit jumpy, dashing away quickly never to be seen again if I swim toward them.
But these are not jumpy at all. There were 4 at first. After observing them a good long while I swim off to look at other sea life. At the end of the snorkel, I return to say goodbye to the 4 squids, and that’s when I discover that there are now 10 squids.
They seem to want to stay near the buoy, and even when we get close to them, they would swim away, we would follow and they would lead us in a large circle and swim back toward the buoy.
The short 5-minute goodbye turns into another 20 minutes in the water. And I could stay even longer we are not hurrying off to our next appointment.
Tuna Carving
Our next appointment is with a restaurant in Itoman district where they have a tuna carving show twice a day. It is about 10 minutes past the airport, so departure day is the perfect day to hit it. Luckily I was able to make a reservation last week in Japanese using my phone to call and Papa Bear’s phones on Google Translate.
When we arrive it is very quiet in the restaurant. It rurns out the locals arn’t as excited as I am about watching tuna carving. I was worried for nothing and we got front row seats at the counter.
I always wanted to watch a tuna get carved. I kept researching fish market tours not because I wanted to get up at 5 am to walk around a fish operation, but because I wanted to see a tuna get carved. Except on a fish market tour the carving show is not guaranteed.
But here it is guaranteed, and it’s free. What a great deal!
Knowing the show will be in Japanese, we look up a trusty YouTube video to explain all the tuna cuts to us.
Then it’s show time.
We ordered a tuna bowl with multiple cuts to taste. I assumed that the fattier cuts were tastier. But it turns out the fattier cuts are stringier! I normally don’t like lean-cut tuna because it’s stringy back home, but the lean-cut here is my favorite cut.
After a very satisfying meal and show, we head to the airport to fly to Hokkaido. But not before we stop by the gift shop to buy a box of beni-imo to go!
Okinawa’s Airport Aquarium
At the airport, we also say one last goodbye to our favorite fish at the airport aquarium, brought to us by the Chauraumi Aquarium. It’s their “advertising” at the airport. Never have I loved an ad so much.
The crazy thing is, we spot a giant hump head wrasse that we didn’t see less than a week ago when we landed at this airport. It’s so massive that it seems to take up half the tank. How did we miss it?
After looking back at our photos, we are convinced they added the wrasse in the last 5 days. But we’ll never truly know.
Goodbye Okinawa, I’ll miss you dearly. j
Next stop, Hokkaido.