To get to Miyako-jima from Ishigaki is a little hop of about 70 miles. Our flight was only a half-hour, blink and you miss it. This was our plane.
I promise that we booked our hotel based on good reviews and not just because the name was "Allamanda". All Amanda, all of the time! It was actually a wonderful place to stay and we had a very comfortable villa within walking distance to the water.
From our hotel, we could access a really nice walking path that took us through the "jungle" on a loop around a small peninsula.
The well-maintained path led up to a really spectacular viewpoint. We could tell that there would be some amazing snorkeling right from the resort.
If you ever have the chance to stay in Miyako-jima I highly recommend the Allamanda Imgya Coral Village -- we loved being able to walk right down to the water and snorkel the reef.
But we knew there was better snorkeling on the reefs further out, so we booked a boat tour for Monday morning. Monday was the least windy day for the four days of our stay in Miyako. Our tour started off great — it was just us and the crew, practically a private tour. Our captain took us about forty-five minutes offshore to Yabiji Marine Park.
It was an incredible reef, one of the best I’ve ever seen in my lifetime. The variety of corals were all so healthy and unbroken, and we saw many species of fish that we’d never seen before. We even got to see another sea snake slithering around the reef. It was an unbelievably memorable snorkel trip!
It soon became even more memorable though, because the wind picked up and the boat’s engine couldn’t power through the waves. Eventually the engine went completely kaput and we were adrift and getting blown out to sea. Luckily the water wasn’t very deep and there was a sandy spot below to throw out an anchor. It was dicey though, and it evoked PTSD flashbacks to memories of our time living aboard S/V Solstice (Kevin kept murmuring “that’s why we bought a boat with two engines..."). Anyway, the captain hailed another larger snorkel boat to come and pick us up while he and one of the crew waited for a towboat — it was a very dramatic rescue where three of us had to swim to the other boat since it was too risky to raft up. We made it back to port safely, and our rescue boat was generous enough to share some video footage of us from their drone (which I’m sure Kevin will include in the blog video).
One of the crew was rescued along with us -- she had been feeling seasick with the wind and waves and the captain had thought it best for her to go ashore with us. Because we'd had to swim to the rescue boat, we left in a bit of a hurry. Kevin wisely had our dry bag with all our gear, and in the scramble to leave we had made sure to put her cell phone in our dry bag but she'd forgotten to grab her house and car keys. She also did not have any shoes or a change of clothes. So the three of us arrived back at the marina, and we realized if we went back to the hotel she'd be stuck there waiting in the sun with no idea when the captain would be back because the boat was being towed to a different part of the island. She was so nice and we didn't want to leave her sitting all day with nothing, so we convinced her to at least come with us in the rental car and get something to eat for lunch. We ended up spending most of the afternoon eating poke and having a great conversation. Even though I'm sure it was stressful for her (she spoke really good English and kept saying that it had been a very "happening day"...as in an "eventful" day). But I hope we were able to take her mind off being temporarily homeless and shoeless for a few hours until the rest of the crew came back to bring her stuff.
Whew! After such a "happening day", Kevin and I wanted a "nothing-happening day". So on Tuesday we drove to Yonaha Beach and rented some beach chairs for the day to unwind. It was great.
We got there early and had the entire beach almost to ourselves for the first hour or so. The sand was powdery soft and the blue water stretched for miles. It was an amazing and relaxing day.
Later that night, we headed to a club called the Funky Flamingo to watch a Japanese rockabilly band. They sang songs in both English and Japanese. Their act was so fun -- they played hits from the 50s and had so much energy they got the whole crowd up and dancing.
On our last evening on the island we went out for soba and shabu shabu (hot pot). We always joke about how hot pot restaurants should be cheaper because it's just soup and they make you cook the food yourselves. But this was surprisingly rich and flavorful broth so everything was truly delicious. My compliments to the chef!
We would absolutely go to Miyako again, and despite our narrow escape from danger, I was sad to leave it. But we still had four nights in the island chain, this time on the main island of Okinawa. After an uneventful flight to Naha Airport, our stay started out in style, at the luxury Halekulani resort about an hour north of Naha town.
We had booked here with a credit card perk and received an upgrade to one of the nicest hotel rooms we’ve ever stayed in. It had a wraparound porch and sea views from every window. Ah, this is the life!
We were planning to switch hotels mid-stay and Kevin contacted our next hotel to arrange a snorkel tour for Sunday morning. Somewhere, our guardian angels were looking out for us because the tour operator replied that snorkel tours on Sunday would be canceled due to the "approaching typhoon". Wait...what typhoon?! That was the first we’d heard of Typhoon Jangmi, scheduled to arrive on the island on Monday — the exact date we were supposed to fly to Taiwan to catch our flight home. This put us in action mode, and we spent the rest of the afternoon in our luxury suite rescheduling our flight, canceling our Okinawa hotel, and booking an extra two nights in Taipei -- yet another "happening day" for sure! We unfortunately missed out on another very nice credit card award stay at the hotel we had to cancel, but at least we knew we would make our final flight home from Taipei. We stopped by the Intercontinental Hotel's beach to see what we’d be missing out on - it was a pretty nice beach but not worth missing our flight home, let alone enduring a typhoon!
We arrived safe and sound in Taipei on Saturday (in an ironic touch, the weather was absolutely beautiful for both takeoff and landing). And we explored Taipei's Zhongshan District which reminded us a little of Tokyo’s upscale and bustling Ginza district, "scramble" pedestrian crossing included.
We managed to get a table at the famous Din Tai Fung restaurant for a delicious dinner of soup dumplings (xiao long bao). One of these restaurants just opened in Scottsdale, but I think the menu (and prices) will be a bit different.
Meanwhile we kept an eye on Typhoon Jangmi, and as it turned out, it caused the Naha Airport to close entirely. Flights for both Monday and Tuesday were cancelled. So coming here to Taipei a couple days early was definitely the right call - otherwise we would have been stuck in Okinawa during the storm and also missed our flight home to Phoenix from Taipei.
We had booked our final night at yet another swanky credit card point hotel so at least while we wait around to leave for our flight I can finish writing the blog in a luxury balcony suite. Never mind that our balcony just overlooks other apartment balconies with rusty A/C units and laundry drying on the lines. I won't include a photo; instead here's what the hotel looks like at night (I've concluded that in general everything in Taipei looks better at night). What a whirlwind of a trip this has been (with more "happening days" than we would have liked at the end) but I think we are both looking forward to coming home!
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