In September Ben and I flew to Guam to visit Marcus on a port call during his deployment. I have always wanted to go back to his beautiful Island where I spent my most awkward preteenage years. The Island's location from Japan couldn't be better which allowed me the perfect chance to return. After about a three hours by train and a three and one-half hour flight away from the busy Narita Airport we arrived to peaceful sandy beaches and tropical fishy seas all on a tiny American territory. We arrived to Guam in literal sea of Japanese tourists, recovered our luggage and then waited in another sea of patient Japanese tourists for our Car rental attendee to call our name. We waited...and waited...and waited and then finally we were the only two left when the representative finally showed up. First challenge, driving the incredibly spacious Hyundai Accent hatchbatch (comically huge compared to our super tiny Japanese car) on the right hand side of the road...and find the hotel. So after about 10 minutes in the car, mostly sitting in traffic on "Hotel row" we arrived at the hotel in Tamuning.
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The next day the ship pulled in so we went to the Naval base to pick up Daddy. We spent the next few days hiking, snorkeling on the beach and exploring the Island. Overall, it was a nice trip though far from perfect. We went through three rental cars. The first got a flat tire, the the second one's check engine light came on, the third was the charm in our case and a boat by Japanese standards (Hyundai Elantra). We also had to switch our hotel room after the second night because of a water leak. The weather wasn't very nice as it was the middle of rainy season, it was a cool 81 degrees and rained almost everyday. Despite the various problems setting our plans back a little, we didn't let it ruin our plans and the rain was no issue for us. We spent every day out in seclusion. Literally every beach we went to, there were little to no other people. We enjoyed snorkeling, and Ben swam alongside us and even tried to snorkel a few times, but the mask was too uncomfortable for him. With the help of his life jacket he floated and swam alongside of us as we snorkeled for hours. What a little champ, we were so proud of him! The tourists tend to stay in the tourist area of Tamuning, and locals go to the other, harder to access, beaches. Since it is rainy season, not even the locals are at the beaches. It was nice, relaxing and quality family time. We really only ventured to "Hotel Row" in the evenings for some ice cream and a few amusement rides for Benjamin.
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| Hiking in the wrong direction looking for Sharks'Cove. |
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| Coral rock piles (?) in the Jungle on our way to Shark's Cove. |
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| Shark's Cove |
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| During our drive around the Island. |
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| Bridge at Talofofo Falls...Marcus kept shaking it...I wasn't happy about that. |
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| One of the two Talofofo Waterfalls. |
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| We're still wondering how Sweet this tuba really was. |
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| On the beach at Anderson AFB before some good snorkeling. |
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| Asan Beach, one of two landing spots for U.S. Troops in WWII where thousands were killed by the Japanese. |
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| Ben's first Bumper car ride on the "Boonie" Bumper cars at Talofofo Falls. Just look at that face! |
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| Visiting Gab Gab Beach, my favorite childhood beach. |
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| Close up of Hotel Row from our hotel room. |
After only three days with Marcus we had the sad duty of dropping him back off at the Pier...that was not fun and left both of us feeling not so happy. Ben and I still had two days left on the Island and of course they were both 95 degrees and sunny. So we went to the Aquarium in the tourist area, and caught up on some rest. On the last day we spent 4 1/2 hours at one of the water parks slathered in sun block, where we floated on the lazy river and Ben learned to boogie board in a matter of less than an hour. Overall it was a really nice vacation from Japan's busy streets, but we were both so ready to come back home. Thank goodness for the free whiskey and soda's on Japan Airlines...they are doing so many things right!
Information on Guam and map courtesy of :
http://www.lonelyplanet.com/guam
