Okinawa : Instead of watching the first sunrise of the year, I went whale-watching!!!

So much has happened and so little time to write everything. Well, the new year has started and I am slowly breaking my new resolutions - huhuhu. Nonetheless, happy new year to all and may the new year brings you better tidings.

Hi there!

Well, my title of this post probably gave away the fact that I was not in Tokyo for the new year. Well, where am I? *wink *wink.

Ah.... We have the smell of the sea, the palm trees and yes, mildly warm weather - Yipee, I am in Okinawa! 

Well, what do I do on the first day of arrival in Okinawa? A whale watching trip! 

Unfortunately Okinawa had a little rain that day. But I was lucky and saw a few humpbacks. It was an exciting first time experience for me. Actually, before I board the cruise, I asked the person-in-charge if we are able to see any whales this time of the year, but his reply was vague and non-committal so I felt almost disappointed and sure that we will not see any. 

But we saw 2 whales at once and several others, and we even got to see the tail for 1 or 2 of them.  So the viewing went well enough and I had a soaking great time photographing the whales in the rain in the middle of the sea.

There were 2 of them! Maybe a mother and its baby?

But the boat ride was a little crazy. Well, the cruise has two decks, one is the main deck and the other is the viewing deck. On the main deck, there were about 10 rows of seats (3 on each side of the centre isle). And above every other row of the seat on each side was about 5 paper bags (with a smaller plastic bag inside) hanging from a string. 

So on this particular day, the seas were behaving quite badly. The ride was a little choppy and we sailed over a few rather large (and even alarming) waves. About half way there (about 20mins ride), one guy got himself a bag and squatted down behind the last row (which happens to be my row of seating). 

Then when we got to the spot where the whales were, the crew invited us to the upper deck, and about half the people went up. So I went up and had a nice time up there. From the viewing deck, I managed to capture several pictures of the whales. 

And when we eventually returned to the lower deck to go back to land, to my astonishment, the whole crowd downstairs had shuffled around and MOST of the paper bags were missing from their strings with more people with green faces, obviously suffering from seasickness! 

Fortunately, I was a bit stronger when it comes to seasickness! But those poor folks. 

How did you spend your new year? Share with me.