Okinawa: Zakimi-Jo Castle

When travelling to Okinawa there are a lot of opportunities to visit a wide range of historical sites. The main collection of sites are called the Okinawan World Heritage sites. Most of these sites are old or remodeled castles but there are a few stranger ones like Sefa-Utaki, a pair of boulders leaning together said to be a door to the spirit realm. Today I would like to share about our small journey to Zakimi-Jo.

It was a small walk up some stairs and through a path to get to the main entrance of the castle. Now when I say castle I mean more of a castle wall. Most of whats left of the castle are some interestingly built stone walls and barriers. The actual insides of the castle are gone now and this is all that remains. If you would like to visit a beautiful in tack castle in Okinawa head down to Shuri Castle. It has a massive grounds and in the inside is an amazing red remodeled castle. I'll be posting about it in the near future.

Here is the front side of Zakimi-Jo and the small path that leads up the hill to it. You can see from this view most of whats left. It loops around the center courtyard and has several outer walls and paths that you can see once inside. However for the most part this is what you're going to see. Once inside you can climb up some beautiful stone staircases and walk along the top of the wall. From there you get a pretty nice view of the surrounding area and ocean.

An overview of the castle and an explanation.

And thats that. We got some wonderful footage of the surrounding neighborhood with the GoPro from the top of the wall and had fun relaxing in the breeze. This location is definitely geared towards the easy going traveler looking to appreciate the culture.

Okinawa: Cape Zanpa Lighthouse

If you ever visit Okinawa and aren't familiar with its local cuisine, I highly recommend you seek out a few places to try some of the most popular dishes. These include but aren't limited to Goya Champuru (a bittermelon dish) and Okinawan Soba which happens to be my absolute favorite! Go to a few different places because there are always slight differences between what you get. Today we started off lunch at one of the famous locations in Ginowan called GON soba. From what I understand there might be a few other locations as well.

GON soba sign by the road.

Me by the front door. I didn't take pictures inside and of the food because it was a very local oriented restaurant and I wanted to be respectful. That being said, don't feel shy to take pictures! Just be mindful that Japanese people don't often want to be captured in other peoples photos.

The food inside was absolutely amazing! It was a great way to start my Okinawan Soba binge and I would definitely go back if I ever have the chance. After lunch we headed to today's post's main attraction, Cape Zanpa Lighthouse.

Being that Okinawa is a string of hundreds of islands off the main island of Japan, it has a lot of ocean and cliff side oriented locations to visit. Cape Zanpa is definitely one of the more popular ones but not over crowded. It should be noted that we did make it there later in the day when most people had already left and the ticket booth to walk up to the top of the light house was already closed. We could still see everything just couldn't enter the lighthouse. I believe tickets were 200 yen which is around $2 right now. Regardless of whether or not you buy the ticket, the location is worth the drive by itself.

Blue Seal is arguably Okinawa's most famous Ice Cream and can be found all throughout the island. Here was a food truck selling out by the lighthouse.

As you can see the location was stunning and also claims a beautiful spot to watch the sunset if you are willing to stay till then. The lighthouse sat on a cliff side where you could look out over the ocean and nearby tide pools. We even saw someone surfing out in the waves but I'm not sure if its recommended as it seemed like a rather dangerous place to be swimming. 

The cliff side view from right under the light house.

Another attraction nearby to note was the cute little goat pen right next to the free parking lot and bathroom. People were paying the stand in charge of it for a small cup of carrots and the goats were loving it. They looked happy and well fed. There were even some small "kids" in the pen frolicking around and climbing the rocks.

Overall it was a great thing to see and was time well spent. Add this to your list if you want to see the ocean, lighthouse, have some blue seal while you watch the waves, and feed some cute goats.