Izu Peninsula

With our time in Japan more than halfway done, we've made a travel list. A travel spreadsheet, really, detailing all of the places we'd like to see while we are still on this side of the world. With a longer appetite for destinations than time, we made the most of Labor Day weekend by heading out to explore the Izu Peninsula. While not too far a drive from our house (about 4 hours to the tip of the peninsula), Izu offers a national park and beautiful scenery with a coastal twist. Most of our time was spent hiking the Kawazu Seven Falls trail, which was a stunning forested river trail amounting to John's favorite wilderness setting. We loved meandering the path and taking in several waterfalls along the way, rather than hiking to just one. A visit to our hotel's hot public baths and a relaxing return drive completed our weekend getaway and made the addressing of this line item on our travel list a resounding success!

JohnPaul's inaugural trek in the hiking backpack!

Wasabi fields!

Wasabi root for sale, a common crop of the region.

Crazy corkscrew bridge!

This river carved itself through old lava flows. Here you can see the fractured lava walls of the small canyon.

A waterfall around every curve!

JohnPaul was quite a hit on our hike!

And here he is being mobbed again...this happened several times :-).

We marveled at the engineering of the curved staircase suspension bridges like this one on the hiking trail.

Hotel shenanigans...family selfie!

Beautiful coastal views from this winding highway on the western coast of the peninsula.

Wandering picturesque Perry Road in Shimoda.

Has your path ever been crossed by a crab? In town??? We were surprised to spot several in Shimoda!