Oba Chan's Freedom Cache

What a beautiful day it turned out to be here on Okinawa! 70 degrees, sunny, a light breeze, and low humidity (well, low humidity for here). Who could ask for more? (click the pics for full size versions)

Got Wind?


Island trees, swaying in the breeze

After a good lunch at a local Chinese restaurant, my son and I teamed up with a friend of mine to hit a few geocaches in the area. Two of them were new finds for me, and we hit four others that I've found before. I don't mind re-visiting caches, since my friend hasn't found them, and almost every cache here on Okinawa is hidden at a point of significant interest.

We started off by heading to a cache at a local driving school. We quickly made the find, and then headed off to a cache called, "Oba Chan's Freedom Cache." The name is based on the fact that the cache owner calls his wife's grandmother, "Oba Chan." His wife is Okinawan. It's called "Freedom Cache," because it's hidden at a cluster of small caves that were used as hiding places by the locals during World War II. Some of them didn't survive, but those that did only survived because of the shelter provided by these caves. The history behind the location gave this find a much greater significance.

After climbing around the hill where the caves are located, we headed off to a few other local caches, including one hidden at the Agena Castle. There's also a bull ring there, where the locals enjoy watching the bull fights. Don't worry, it's not like the Spanish style of bull fighting. Here on Okinawa, the bulls fight each other, and it's more of a pushing and shoving match than anything. The bulls don't get hurt, and whichever one gets tired first loses.

At Agena Castle


After a full afternoon of caching, my son and I said goodbye to my friend and headed for home. On the way home, we saw a man walking his bull down the road, just like you would walk a dog. I decided that I wanted to get a picture of that, so we turned around, and headed back the way we came. By the time we got back to where the bull was, the man had rounded a bend in the road, and come across yet another man walking a bull. The two bulls decided that they didn't need a bull ring, and they began to fight. They flung their owners around a little bit, but the two men managed to get the bulls pulled apart.

Them's fightin' words!


The bulls will quit when they're good and ready