Southwest Botanical Gardens

On Thursday, we were thinking about going to the small zoo on the island, but a friend of Tosha's suggested that we try the Botanical Gardens.  I am glad that we did.  It was beautiful and fun to see all of the different plants and animals on display....and a little bit of culture thrown in along the way.

I took lots of pictures of plants and scenery and the animals, too, so it is hard to choose what to include.  If you don't like pictures of animals and plants, you may want to skip this post.  However there are some interesting things.............

These were interesting statues.  You can get paint from a worker and paint these white cows to your heart's content.  Then every night they wash them off so that other kids can paint the next day.  I think I need one in my backyard for grandkids to paint on.

They had a little animal area with the typical chickens...

and MICE???!!. Yep, this open air tray held about 6 mice that kids could hold or watch or feed.  Not your usual animals in a petting zoo.  They also had guinea pigs, turtles, goats and baby chicks.

Niki preferred the non-alive animals as he reached out to "pet" this painted statue near one cage.

 Here are the baby chicks.  I am not sure how many of these will actually make it to adulthood.

 Of course they had ducks walking around like they owned the place.  These children followed this duck around for quite a while.

 These bush trees along the side of the lake looked like something from Dr. Seuss.  They were awesome.

As we were walking along we heard a large crack and as I looked up, I saw a limb from a tree falling to the ground.  It landed a couple of feet away from me but it really got my heart beating.  Fortunately Tosha and Niki were behind me and no one else was nearby.  I dragged it to the side of the path and took this picture.  It sounded bigger than it looks in real life.......

This is an orchid which they are trying to attach to the bark/truck of this tree.  They had several of these through this area.  I don't know much about the growing of orchids but this must be one of the ways they grow best.  It is hard to tell but they are tied to the tree with a twine and then there is a ball of dirt and twine under the plant.

I can't remember what this animal is called but it was very friendly and loved eating food out of your hand.

Since we didn't find the random item that I wanted, we headed back to the shopping street in Naha.  It was a holiday and traffic was terrible.  We were inching along when we saw a shop with the item right out front.  At the current pace of traffic it seemed like a good idea to hop out of the car, buy the item and get back in another block up the street.  After all, Niki was sleeping in his car seat and it would save the cost of parking somewhere.  So after a quick conversation, I hop out and run in the store to buy the one item.

It took me less than two minutes and I was back out on the street and started walking quickly up the block assuming that she would be a block or two ahead.  All I could see is green lights all along the street and no Tosha.  I started running up the next block thinking she must be there but no luck and traffic was running smoothly when minutes before we had inched along for blocks.

I decided to head back to the original store, figuring  that Tosha would have to work out a way around the block and she would be back.

While I waiting I was able to enjoy the sights and sounds of the city street (there were probably smells, but I can't report on those.)

I enjoyed the time to look around.  I saw a McDonalds delivery motorcycle (but no picture because I wasn't prepared with my camera.) I was asked to take a survery by a teenager with very slow but good English.  I was asked which beach in Okinawa was my favorite.  I didn't know any of them so that ended the survey....

and I waited for Tosha.

 and waited some more.....I was standing there about 20 minutes before I noticed this bizarre hand coming out of the building just a few steps away from where I was standing.  Spooky!  I told you that there are lots of interesting painting and things around Okinawa.  You never know what you might see around the corner.

And I waited some more.  I didn't have cell coverage because I was in Okinawa and after about 30 minutes I was wondering what I would do if Tosha had been in an accident.  I was actually having a great time enjoying the city but I knew she would be worried about me and I didn't want her to worry.

Finally I saw her wave to me across the street and after misplacing her briefly when she turned into a parking lot to wait for me, we were back together.  Immediately after I had hopped out, the traffic started flowing and there were only green lights.  She actually saw me run down the blocks as she had made a left turn and then circled back to take a alley road, but she was five cars back so she couldn't get my attention and then she couldn't turn back on to the street I was on because that turn wasn't allowed, so then she had to circle around and figure out the streets to get back to where I was. Needless to say, they are not built on a grid pattern like Salt Lake.

We were ready for lunch by the time we got together so we stopped at a simple corner shop and bought some of these and some ice cream. They are wrapped in green stuff that sushi is made with, and filled with sticky rice and in my case tuna.  It is shaped like a triangle and you have to unwrap a certain way to get all of the plastic off in the right way.  I was a bit hesitant--7/11 food isn't my favorite but I loved these.  You can buy them for your kids' sack lunch. They were very tasty if you like tuna and sticky rice.

good stuff.

The ice cream was good as well.