Goodbye Misawa

With our time here having come to an end, we've spent the last week or so getting our last fill of everything we enjoyed here in Misawa. It has been a "Best of Misawa, Japan" kinda week and we figured we'd put up a post to give family and friends an idea of where our dinner and lunch outings take us and what exactly Misawa looks like on a day-to-day basis.

Food in Japan runs up one side and down the next. Everything from the obvious sushi and noodle shops, to the less likely Indian restaurant. The following were our most visited establishments over the years and a quick explanation of why we liked them.

Cafe Live Forever
We only found out about Cafe Live Forever a few months ago but it hooked us immediately. Sandy always had the friend chicken set and I loved the mushroom chicken pasta. What really makes this place a must visit are the scones though. At ¥90 each, they make a delicious quick breakfast in the morning and in conjunction with my weekend coffee...nothing comes close.


Karinba's Chinese Restaurant
If sweet and sour is what you're looking for, there is none better than Karinba's. A staple of the lunch special menu, you can't go wrong with either sweet & sour pork or chicken.


Cheese Roll House
More popularly known as simply, Cheese Roll, this is the best yakisoba in all of Misawa. The cheese rolls themselves aren't bad, but something changed about a year ago and they've never been the same. Certainly not the most obvious restaurant in Misawa, nor the most modern, but a large serving of the beef Yakisoba will satisfy anyone's appetite.


Grill Omiya
Known as Pizza & Curry by American's in Misawa, this is my favorite restaurant. On every visit, the B set, pork, 5. That translates into curried rice set with pizza toast, fried pork cutlet on top of that rice, and 5 is the scale of spicyness that runs from mild through 5 and 10 and so on...up to special 3 and beyond. My body only asks for 5 and I respect its wishes. Sandy always has an order of cheese rolls, bowl of corn soup, and some chicken fried rice. We will always remember Pizza & Curry as this is essentially where our relationship began over an hour and a half long meal.


Ram Tei
Yakaniku at its best. His 15 secret spice seasoning is the best i've ever had. Now in this new building, Ram Tei has been the type of place where you rally up 6 to 8 of your hungriest friends and set off in an effort to eat all the meat he has. This is you cooking your own meat, however you like it. Nothing less...but oh so much more than can be described.


Ankur India Restaurant
Two words, "butter chicken." This was already one of our favorite places to eat with the all you can eat buffet of nan, safron rice, and various choices of curry...then came butter chicken curry. Seeing it for the first time we gave it a test and it hooked us. Lately, twice a week even. We're both going to miss the delicious nan and butter chicken curry.

Tonight we do have reservations at Yoshino's, (the best steakhouse in Misawa and likely beyond) but that will be the end of our off-base dining binge we've been on for the last 3 weeks. Something that will abruptly come to an end once we arrive in Virginia. We will both miss the area, base, and especially the food. The last thing on our "must do" list was visit the Komaki Onsen for one last time. It just so worked out that I was the only person on the mens side and was able to snap off quite a few shots to give everyone a better understanding of what an onsen looks like. I think they're all pretty self explanitory, so enjoy.







Well that's it. We'll be on a plane here in about 17 hours. Next stop Atlanta and then on to Virginia. So long Misawa.

The Ride of a Lifetime

After 4 times of being canceled for any number of reasons, today was Sandy's first time traveling at over 500 knots, sideways, upside down, and practically inside out while pulling up to 7.3 G's in the process. Her first word after getting out of the jet...amazing.

It all started with a pre-brief from "PIG"(call sign) where all the basics of flight are covered. Things like ejecting, ground egress, dealing with bird strikes in the canopy, and a once over of every button that you should never ever touch. Some basics huh? Even though I wasn't the one flying I had to keep telling myself that "this will be fine, they have hundreds of flights per year and no incidents here in Misawa." Further, even though I'm a believer in odds...I do know that when something goes wrong it did so 100% of the time THAT time. Not sure what it is...but this part really struck me as it was such a casual once over of some very critical bits of life saving information.

After the brief Sandy suited up and then it was time to head out to the jet!

On the way out to the jet we met up with the other two flyers and pilots decided to try and go out as a 3 ship formation which would have given everyone the chance to see a little bit of what it's like to fly right next to another fighter...BUT...as is usually the case with aircraft, flexibility is truly the key. First Sandy's jet wouldn't start and then the 2 others couldn't afford to sit around burning fuel while they waited. So no cool formation flying for Sandy today.

The pre-flight routine is pretty neat to watch when you don't see it every day. The process is almost choreographed. The crew chiefs run their steps, the pilots run theirs, and in the moments where the two cross paths it's as if they've timed everything just right and the hand signals, words, and actions just flow. Based on what Sandy described of the radio traffic and the actions I saw standing out around the jet, it really is just like in the movies. A thumbs up here, a whirl of the hand there, and flaps begin to move, engines fire up the sound of freedom, and then it all culminates with a quick salute and off goes the jet. Here are some pictures leading up to taxiing and take off.

Within 10 minutes of takeoff PIG had given Sandy control of the aircraft and the first thing she did was try to maintain an altitude of 18K feet. Apparently that's much harder than it sounds. Then commenced the show and go portion of the flight. PIG would give a 5 second verbal instruction followed by the expected result of the input to the aircraft and then it was her turn. She performed barrel rolls, loops, split S, engaged in some cloud racing, and several climbs and dives between about 13K and 21K feet.

Her favorite part of the entire flight was the feeling of zero gravity while performing the split S maneuver. Next was the loops and the actual take off. The worst part...pulling out of a split S and directly entering a barrel roll. This quickly induced a return delivery of every fluid consumed in the hours leading up to flight. Not to worry though...all that life support equipment comes with barf bags and she made good use of both of them.

After the 1 hour 15 minute flight they touched back down in Misawa where I was waiting along the taxiway to get some final pictures of a memorable day.
A big thanks to PIG for making this an awesome day which truly was the ride of a lifetime.

Yagen Valley in the Fall

As summer turns to fall and our time here in Misawa comes closer to an end, we're getting our fill of travels, sights, and activities. Having had a great time on our last visit to Yagen we decided to get a large group of people together and head up for one last trip. Only difference in this trip was that the air was a little cooler and the leaves had just begun to turn.

Setting up near the main fire pit this time, the perfect weather made for a relaxing evening as the sun set behind the hills. Everyone had a chance to enjoy cold drinks and grill up their steaks, dogs, and eventually smores.

The rest of these pictures are from the valley and surrounding areas. On Sunday Sandy and I just headed off with no particular goal but the guarantee that the GPS would lead us home
eventually.



We're both going to miss the Shimokita Peninsula...especially in the Fall.

Sea Kayaking on Lake Ogawara

So in the process of researching things to do around Langley AFB in Virginia, I came across a website dedicated to sea kayaking. Reading a bit more I found myself becoming quite interested in the idea of a relaxing paddle in and around some of the channels that feed Hampton Roads.

Not having the first clue about what it takes to go Kayaking, off we went to Outdoor Recreation and signed up for the Sea Kayaking course here on base. While not an official course in any way, it's a prerequisite to being able to rent a kayak or participate in any of the kayaking trips offered by Outdoor Rec. Even though we don't have much time left to enjoy kayaking here, we figured this would be a good way to learn the basics of kayaking so that when/if we decide to buy our own we won't be starting out from absolute scratch.

After 3 hours in the pool on Thursday evening, it was out into Lake Ogawara for a leisurely paddle. A little history here, Lake Ogawara was used by the Imperial Japanese Navy to practice the attack on Pearly Harbor. The lake was chosen based upon its resemblance of Pearl and the depth of the water allowed pilots to practice launching torpedoes in conditions they could expect in Hawaii. Anyway, back into the water...

Since nobody had anything pressing to do today, we went for it all and set off to completely cross the entire lake, return back towards a northern point, and then follow the coastline all the way back to the base beach. It looked a little something like the map below and covered about 5 miles by my rough measure.

We were fortunate enough to have perfect weather throughout the morning. No wind, plenty of sun (too much sun for me), and a water temp that was quite refreshing when we ended up playing around with the different rescues. Below are some pictures of our trip around the lake.








At the end of the day we were plenty exhausted but we're both eager to see what the Virgina waters will have to offer us...oh, and Thailand too...I've read about some beautiful kayaking/canoeing trips that we can take advantage of in December.

Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles Game

Professional baseball in Japan is nothing close to what it is in the US. I think there are very few ballparks that carry the level of passion for the game as they do here in Japan. Our second year in a row attending a game over Labor Day weekend, we got started early Saturday morning on the Shinkansen.

The Japanese E2 Series Shinkansen. Traveling up to 170 miles per hour and providing a comfort level far beyond any bus, car, or plane. Well plane that you and I can afford anyway. After about two hours on the train we arrived in Sendai, walked about 6 blocks to our hotel, The Holiday Inn, and then made our way down to what is officially known as "Kleenex Stadium Miyagi." Home of the Rakuten Eagles.

Pregame festivities include everything from kids playing catch in the outfield, cheerleaders running up and down the foul lines, and a giant stinky fish fry outside the ballpark. With the game underway, the entire stadium was chanting each players custom fight song which I've yet to fully comprehend...even when the American players are up to bat.

Throughout the game we had rain showers come and go, saw some good baseball, ate "interesting" ballpark food, and participated in the 7th inning stretch custom of releasing these red balloons following a Japanese equivalent of Take Me Out to the Ballgame.

While the Eagles couldn't quite pull out a win in extra innings, we were both happy to be back in Sendai over Labor Day weekend and keeping with what seems to be our Ryan and Sandy standard for any trip...we enjoyed a solid downpour on the walk back to the hotel.