夏休みを始めましょ！

(translation of title: Let's start summer holidays!)


So some of you probably started summer a long time ago. Back in May, right? Well, this weekend is the official kick off of summer in Japan. The beaches are now officially open here on Gotou and will continue to be so for about a month. Not that you can't go when they are not officially open, just don't expect any of the nice amenities like showers, somen noodle stands, or a direct bus stop. The showers and somen we can live without but we like the summer bus routes. Otherwise, you might see us treking many kilometers. Like when we went to Takahama over Golden Week. 45 minutes on a bus then one hour of walking to the beach. But it is a gorgeous beach.



There is a beach within relative walking distance from our house but last year we were a little disappointed with it. As in we don't like to find medical waste and random trash from Australia littering the beach where we want to play. To give poor Mukada beach the benefit of the doubt, we had been having a lot of gale force winds so it was probably not the best day to go to any beach. Also, with the declining population, many of the beaches are ignored for the more popular ones so there is no one there to groom the smaller beaches.

So my mission this summer, since it will be our last on this island, is to find a good beach near us. We scouted out one beach on Saturday but the sea was a little choppy that day so it was hard to judge. We are using this Gotou Tourism website to do a little exploring from home and comparing it with our trusty bus route and schedule website. The top two contenders are currently Ohama Beach
and Hamada Beach, seen here:


Today we were supposed to go to Ohama Beach to celebrate 海の日 (usually translated as Marine Day but since in America we think of another type of Marine, I like to translate it to Sea Day) but the forecast calls for rain so I guess it will have to wait until Saturday. And Sunday. And all the weekends after that.