Japan: Okinawa: Nakagusuku Castle, American Village and Okinawa Hai Sushi review.

There are several historical sites in Okinawa, Nakagusuku Castle is one of the UNESCO world heritage sites on the island.

The castle was built during Ryukyu Kingdom (yea more people known Okinawa as Ryukyu actually, especially the older generation). It is one of the 100 most famous castles in Japan.

I am not a fans of history but i like panorama / spectacular view. I happened to know this castle is sitting on the top of a hill and overlooking the sea and the city, plus we have limited time in the first day arrival and it is one of the closest attraction from our first day apartment. Hence we decided to pay a visit in the late afternoon.

Oh, before photos, we were renting a car without GPS but i don't know why our car's GPS was working anyway anyhow, so we relied it a lot when looking for places.

In-car GPS in Japan is easy to use, of course it could be set in English. It all fine if you do not know the exact address, all you need to do is key in the phone number and the GPS will locate the place and lead you the way!

Do not be surprise if you get a phone number in some tourist attraction, such as the below castle. At first we thought that must be some office number and could possible lead us to the wrong place, but it wasn't! All we need to do is to look for the phone number and key it then we all set to go!

And oh again! This post is about places that we visited in the first day. You can refer here if you wish to see my original itinerary but if you know me well, i almost never follow plan, haha.

I was ambitious to visit several places nearby but end up we only visited the castle before heading to America Village for dinner.

So my real first day itinerary was..
1. Arrived Naha Airport
2. Collect car and check-in into Beachside condominium. 
3. Late lunch and rest
4. Nakagusuku Castle
5. American Village jalan-jalan
6. Dinner at Gourme Kaiten Sushi Ichiba

Clear road sign to everywhere

We were very late but managed to got in.

Nakagusuku Castle

Ta-da! Spectacular! Please take note that you need to walk half hour up-hill to see this. 

another side of view.

sitting on the green green grass and looking at the sea is such a great enjoyment in life.

me and my no-longer-wearable walking shoes. 

cloud gone and sun was here again after we spent half hour on the peak.

there the old wall and rough structure of the castle.

staircase with handle, but you need to be average fit to visit the whole site. 

the site is still being re-construct, these are the parts to be place back to the castle.

another side of the peak, here we can see the overall structure of the building.

it is a great old building i must say.

peaceful and calm in today, but it has been through several wars in the past.

the model of the original building. It is hilly, hence building the massive building on top is extra difficult.  

We spent more than an hour here because both of us take our time when seeing places. If you are touch-and-go type of person, i am sure you can see the whole thing within half hour. 

Please take note if you are planning to visit Nakagusuku Castle.

1. You have to average fit to visit the site. (short uphill walk from parking to the entrance, then rocky stair and up- and down-hill trail)

2. Okinawa is hot during the noon time, not much shade in the site so visit the place during morning or late after is recommended. 

3. Bring water and snack, no hawker around the site, the nearest place to see seller is at the parking place. (Of course, do not litter!)

We wasn't hungry yet after the trail, but we had not enough time for another castle visit so we decided to go American Village earlier for a walk, as well as enjoy the sunset view in the sunset beach before dinner. 

Oh, if you are shopper or prefer civilize, American Village should be one of your fav places on the island. We only love their sushi so spent a very short time in there. 

we arrived way earlier, but we only took the sign's photo after our dinner.

Just right when we arrived the beach in the village. Oh yea this is not the view but our ride haha.

here is the view.

and then walkie around the village. 

decorated like a cowboy town, American village mah.  

Photowhore would love this place. 

American Village filled with lotsa restaurant, pub, shopping place, even a funfair, it is a place for family. Day time is rather quiet but night time is quite happening.

It is not a big area so its fine to park your car on one spot and walk through the area. But please take notes that it is an open air area, so do not expect air-con everywhere. I would suggest to have early dinner in the area and walk afterward. 

For dinner place, we chose (and we glad we chose that) Gourme Kaiten Sushi Ichiba. After read countless posts on the internet, we filtered all western food (lotsa western food there!) and want sometime more Japanese (also lotsa Japanese restaurant) but Hai got the best review although the restaurant is not as fancy as others. 

The place is clean, the food is awesome, the price makes us super happy. We had more than 10 plates of fresh sushi, chawanmuchi and fish soup, and its only cost us 2300 yen, equal to about RM60 as at July 2015!

The two down things was no English menu (yea it is go-around sushi but you can order something not on the bell) and long queue! We waited for close to an hour to get our seat.

Our dinner place! 

If you can read chinese, you can spot a plate with Chawamuchi paper sign on the bell. Grad that and pass it to waiter for hot and fresh chawanmuchi!  

Menu, English tak ada. But if you can read Chinese, you can understand / guess some. Again, do be shame or shame on someone from Chinese background. Hmpf! 

My favorite of the night! Damn see the eggs! This is countless times worth and yummier than Sushi King!

His favorite. The sea grapes sushi. 

Sushi plates scanner, i "wow" when i saw this. 

First day in Okinawa was funfilled and satisfied! Love this little island in the sign! Second day was another fun day which we visited a lot of awesome places!

I shall be back soon for the next post, so stay tuned la!

Last but not least, me! Taken by him!

Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
0707pm, 191215
Gosh 2015 is over soon!