Just one more little trip!

So, my good friend April is leaving Iwakuni on September 24.  She asked if I would come visit one more time before she left.  And of course, I wanted to, but couldn't figure out how to squeeze it in after my Philippines trip and before Dan left town for a week 2 weeks later.  Plus I needed a Command letter to fly Space A, and then I needed a flight!

So.... Josh and I got back Monday night.  Wednesday at 10:45am, Dan called and said, "I have your Command Letter and I just got off the phone with the Terminal.  There is a flight arriving in 30 minutes that will turn around and go back to Iwakuni.  If you can get there in the 30-45 minutes, you can get on the flight!"

What?!!  I sent Josh a message that I was running away, packed my bag and was almost ready by the time Dan came to get me.  He drove me to the Futenma Terminal and they were super nice.  I checked in they gave me a thumbs up and I was good to go!  The pilot was a friend of my friends Steph, and was very nice as well.

Goodbye Okinawa!  I was on my own personal private flight on a C-17 to Iwakuni!

Hello Iwakuni!!

Steph, April, Char and I went to Miyajima on Thursday.  It was a perfect day with perfect weather.

We went to the iconic Torii to get a photo.

We were suppose to get a nice selfie, but got this instead.

A sweet girl passing by got a good shot for us.

And then I got photobombed.

I still got my selfie though!

I got to do all the things I wanted!  I saw lots of friends, and got to hang out with most of them.  I got to go to my favorite thrift store and I bought gorgeous kimonos that I mailed to myself.  I got to eat yummy things and see places I like.  If I could have planned a perfect trip, that would have been it.  (Except I'd have eaten at Sako's and Devi's!)

My friend Hope introduced me to this awesome little bakery with adorable desserts.  I may have gone there twice and gotten cakes each time.

Friday evening I went and checked in to catch the weekly Rotator back to Okinawa.  It was smooth sailing with plenty of seats to go Space A.  I got ticketed and then just had lots and lots of time to wait.

But I got on the plane and got home.  Just a lot later than expected. (At 9pm Friday night)  But I had a wonderful trip and I have the best family that supported me to be able to do this.  They did a great job taking care of themselves without me and were just fantastic.  I am so lucky!

Field Trippin' with Delaney

 I had the dubious honor of chaperoning Delaney's third grade field trip to the Mikawu Mines.  It went better than I had anticipated, but still... 70 third graders running and screaming in dark tunnels?  Yikes!

It was pretty dark in there.

There was a game to find clues, but it was mostly in Japanese, so I have no idea what the goal was! 

Lots of fun things to play in. 

And lots of things to have fun with. 

After the mad dash through the dark mine, there was "digging" for gems... 

 ...and panning for gold.  Delaney had a very good time.

They offered a special ice cream cone. 

It has real GOLD flakes on it! 

 Delicious!

She was so pleased with herself. 

Delaney's Kimono Photo Shoot

 Delaney's Girl Scout troop decided to use some of their money to get Kimono pictures done.  They paid for the hair and make up and kimono rental, plus one 8x10 picture.  If we wanted more pictures, we had to buy those ourselves.  Thankfully the studio did not care if we took a bunch of our own pictures of the process.

Delaney had a great time. She got to pick out a kimono to wear.  They did her hair and make up.  She didn't care what they did to her hair, so we said do whatever you want.  I LOVED it!  Liked that they just put a tiny bit of make up on- a little pink eye shadow, some blush and a little lipstick.

Then they took photos and we had to chose our favorite.   I did buy an extra photo or two!  They gave us a small digital copy of the picture and we can go back for the prints in 2 weeks.  It was a really neat, really fun experience.

Getting the hair done.

Hair is finished and you can see the back and the front!

Putting on the kimono.

 All done!

Delaney and the 3 other Girl Scouts who were doing it at the same time.  So cute! 

Posing so I can see the back 

I loved all the intricate little details.  Coin purse tucked into the front, little dangling charms, the fan in the obi, the adorable hair clips.... So neat! 

Getting posed for the photos.

I loved this picture of the front and back. 

And this is her studio photo! Kawaii, as the Japanese would say!  So cute!

For her birthday she wanted to.... PARAGLIDE?!!

 Callie said she wanted to go Paragliding for her birthday.  I was a little surprised.  She's not typically adventurous, but she was adamant that she wanted to.  I got her set up to do it and today (Sat May 21) was the only available day before we head to the U.S. this summer.  So, today it was!  Her friend Charlie managed to come along and that made it even more fun.  It also really perplexed the Japanese who could not figure out if she was a boy or a girl and kept asking, "Boy?  Girl?"

We drove out this crazy narrow road through the fields to the landing area.  I waited there at the bottom.

The girls were hopped up on adrenaline and were very silly. 

 They got in the van and drove to the top of the mountain.  I waited at the bottom to catch the landings.  I confess, I wasn't convinced they would jump!

But they did!  See that field there on the top of the mountain?  That's where they launched. This is Callie.

She floated around the air for about 8 minutes. 

She flapped her arms for me, but I wasn't fast enough to get a picture of that. Silly pickle! 

I love this photo.  If you zoom in, you can see the big grin on her face.

Still smiling and coming down for landing. 

All done!

She had a fabulous time and LOVED it.  She wants to do it again! 

And then I drove down the tiny little roads got get us home.  It was a rousing success.

Friendship Day 2016

 Friendship Day is kind of an Airshow and Open House for Iwakuni.  The base opens the gates to all who want to come and see, and they put on an air show and have lot of booths for food and merchandise.  There are also some games and kid play stuffs... all for a fee, of course.  May 5 is the designated day and they were predicting hordes of people to come.  There were hordes, but not as much as expected.  The Kumamoto earthquakes caused the Japanese air show event to be cancelled and a lot of resources went south to Kumamoto.

It was still a jam packed place to be and we squeezed into the fun.

The flight line was full of people.  Fortunately it is huge enough it wasn't too cramped most of the time.

Posing with Callie by the static display. 

Folks picked out good spots to camp out and watch the air show. 

And I do love a good air show! 

This little yellow plane was a lot of fun to see.  Joshua was quite impressed with it's aerobatics. 

I love the Japanese.  This is a very long line to get to tour the inside of that plane. 

Yep.  I brought a stroller to haul stuff and for when Rylee's little legs got tired.  It was a LOT of walking. 

This cracked me up.  Those guys in uniform.... their job was to stand there for photos.  People stood in line to get their pictures taken with them.

 Rylee is photobombing my selfie with the plane.  And I have to tell you how much this made me laugh.  If you look closely at the plane, you can see the pilot in it.  His job was to sit there and smile and give thumbs up so everyone could take his picture.  What a great job!  If you wanted to feel like a celebrity, this was the place to be!

One last selfie on the flight line. 

Heading home and this was too cute.  These kids all helping each other was so sweet.   

Dan and Joshua walking home.  We are almost there!  Since we live on the other side of that wall on the left, we got to take the empty road home.  If you look closely, you can see the teeming throng on the other side of the green barrier. It was kind of crazy!  But a good time.