The Best Reason Ever to Quit Smoking

I passed by this cigarette advertisement today on my way into the local convenience store, and I almost died laughing. I had to grab a photo to share with everyone.





I'm Never Smoking Wintsons Again!

Tetramadness

A few more shots from Unagi-san, and my first attempts at making action sequences in photoshop.





FAIL! But a nice view at least.





This one started out clean, but soon turned into a Frothy Banger.

Sandy Tetrapod Nuggets

The sand has been filling in at all the right places around here recently. Recently a little nook down the coast has been lighting up during the bigger windswell days, with a right that bends around the corner of a tetrapod jetty. Each wave ends about 6 inches of water, so if you go down you will be picking sand out of your crevices for a while. 2 out of every 3 would close out at the end, so I had a lot of sand picking to do. Unagi-san (website coming soon) was set up down the beach with his 500mm one morning taking photos of everyone, including myself. Here are a few stills, more sequences to come.

*All Photos by Unagi-san*

Shimoda Part 2 (of 2)

Al Templeman Look-Alike Spotted in Shimoda! I think this guy might have raided my Dad's closet before he took out the trash this morning.

Overview of Shirahama, when one side of the penninsula is a stormy closed out mess, this side is much cleaner.


And offshore...


The Ramaru Dinner! Hot dog, hamburger and coffee! You must be asking for some serious heartburn if you take down all three of these at once. We opted for the conveyor belt sushi restaurant next door, easy choice to make.


Nice scenery paddling out at Ohama.


Ejecto tube stance.



Me striking 'blue steel' and about to go over the falls.


Local hero, this guy had it wired and was on every good wave that came through at Ohama.



What is this, kneeboarding? Stand up!



Ohama overview, looking right.


... And looking left. Entrance to Shimoda bay far in the distance around the rocks.


Local graffiti on the wall at Ohama, it reads "Local Surfing Spot -->" Luckily I had on my "I'm a local everywhere" T-shirt so I didn't get hassled.


View from the standard room at the Island Avenue pension. You have to lift your head a whole 6 inches off of your pillow to check the waves.


Last day we took a gondola ride up the hill to the top of Mount Nesugata from downtown Shimoda for an overview of the town.


A few views of the main entrance to the bay.






Temple and park at the top.


Thats all folks, at least until I make another trip back out to the Izu Pennisula for some more Shimoda action.

Shimoda Part 1

Took a road trip down to the town of Shimoda, a small town at the bottom of the Izu penninsula. Wasn't exactly sure what to expect out there, but I was pleasantly surprised with the town, the landscape, the beaches, and more importantly the surf.
Much of the landscape reminded me of a mix of big sur, carmel, and hawaii, only without all of the sharks and angry locals.


Not my photo, this is a screenshot from google earth, a great way to scout out new areas.


Driving north through Shizuoka, Fuji-san towers over most of the surrounding landscape. This is not a great photo of Fuji but I had to grab a quick pic of the view from gas station along the main highway.


View from rest stop #1.


View from rest stop #2. After a 5 hour drive I was ready to run straight down the cliff and into the water asap.


Shirahama, lit "white beach" was the first stop. Small waves and prevailing offshore wind.


I can add this one to my collection of ill-posed photos of me pulling into rock-wave-tube formations. Am I the only one who does this?


Offshore 1-foot perfection at Shirahama.


Our pension, "Island Avenue", great views, great food, close to the beach, perfect!



Downtown Shimoda shop.



Iritahama beach exploring.


Course #4 of a 5-course dinner, and Kirin # 823 of the weekend.



Nice afternoon surf at Ohama beach, there are a variety of nooks and crannies for waves to sneak in and do their thing, this is just one of them.



Me on the leftbowl looking to perform an "action"

Spring has Sprung

Has it been a month since my last post? Seems like yesterday...
Don't go any further if you dislike the color yellow at all.

The weather is warming and the fields are blossoming here in Japan, in the next few weeks we will see the sakura trees begin to blossom, for now we have these wild yellow flowers of which I don't know the name.




I wasn't the only one getting my flower photographing on, I counted about 30 people with cameras of all shapes and sizes, along with lenses, tripods, straps, memory cards etc. This field was very well documented this day.









The owners of the field built a handy scaffolding to give everyone a better view, from a distance it resembled a boat with passengers floating on the field.





One interesting thing I noticed was the the industrial gravel pit located a few feet from the field. Everything seemed serene and peaceful as long as you were looking away from the gravel pit.



My retinas were burning after a solid dose of bright yellow for an hour, so I hiked the trail around the lake and reacquainted myself with some old camera tricks.


Vertigo looking up into the tree tops.

Checking to see if my on-camera flash still works. Yep.