Daisekirin National Park

Ever seen a 200 million year old rock??! After visiting Daisekirin National Park I now can say I have! I never thought this would be something I’d absolutely, positively want to see in my however after viewing these extraordinarily ancient limestone karst rocks, that have some how withstood the test of time, I’m glad I have.

Every so often, maybe like twice a year, Ben and I wake up in a much, much too good/motivated mood and decided to drive alllllll the way up to the northern most point of Okinawa. While we usually set our sites on Cape Hedo, this time we decided to finally knock off one of our last few Oki bucket list items: Daisekirin Park. It’s situated in the Yanbaru forest and is home to many “strange rocks” which are literally 200 million years old. If rocks don’t sound exciting to you than you’ve obviously never seen ones that were situated on Pangaea, ya know, the Earth’s only continent at the time!!! Sorry for my nerding out, I took “rocks for jocks” aka Geology in college and loved it!

Ben with the iguana rock

The Yanbaru forest, in which Daisekirin is situated, is very sacred. Like many sacred Okinawan sites, there were quite a few mystical talesments that we could pray to/visit for good fortune. Ben and made sure to place a stone onto the stacked stones pile, we both touched the mystical mountain stone and I made sure to touch the pelvis shaped stone which supposedly helps women with with peculiar diseases. It might seem like I’ve been touching quite a few fertility stones recently, but I can assure you that is merely coincidental!

You’d be hard pressed to go anywhere in Okinawa and not see a great view. Luckily, Daisekirin didn’t disappoint and gave us a great vantage point of the most Northern Point in Okinawa (Cape Hedo) and we also happened to catch a glimpse of our island neighbor to the North, Yoron Island. Thankfully, the sun was shining brightly which made this overlook view even more vibrant and spectacular. It also doesn’t matter how many times you see the ocean, it’s just as captivating each and every time!

Towards the end of the park we came across a colony of cycads which was a very bizarre sight (as you can see below.) We also stopped by the giant spiritual banyan tree and said some prayers for good fortune, it can’t hurt... Right?

Since Ben and I were in fantastic moods, we decided to be brave and tackle the rarely driven East coast highway that snakes down the very uninhabited portion of Okinawa. It ended up taking us three hours to get home, but the strange and beautiful sites along the way made it a mini road trip to remember! Tune in later this week to see more about this trip and thanks for tuning in.