Our yearly trip to Ibusuki

The second Sunday in January is always

Ibusuki Nanohana Marathon Day.

Now for the fifth time, Esther the Car drove us there for this event ..

with of course: Sight Seeing and Birdwatching on the side.

Sunrise over Kagoshima Bay.

Those hills across the pond are in Miyasaki.

  

Happy Man enjoying the Good Weather.

Yamakawa toilet building.

Talking about toilets...the day before the marathon a bug found my belly and so, 
i had to spend a few very uncomfy hours "On the Throne".

(for your interest, not this particular one).

All okay at the end but i didn't feel well enough for the 42K, hence i joined Marijke with Cheering the Runners.....

....and some sightseeing along the race course..

And here comes Yuki Kawauchi.

Bib # 1 is leading the field of 18.000 runners.

Including friends:

Ishii san...

Shimizu san...

Ohara san...

and Noriko san.

The next day we drove Esther on board of the ferry for the short trip across 

Kagoshima Bay to explore that part of the peninsula.

Including the most southerly lighthouse on Kyushu Island. 

 Sata Point.

This part of Kyushu is by times a Typhoon Alley.

Seen at a building site along the road:

Wind forecast for Engineers.

Too bad our day was a very rainy day, but we still enjoyed the drive. Narrowly avoiding hitting wild pigs and monkeys crossing our roads.

In the dark hours we ended up at a smallish fishing port where,  to our surprise, the next morning, we found these dressed-up floats...

ready for the start of the New Year Fishing Season. 

At the fish-market.

Never get tired of looking at these kind of (fishing) boats.

This is a long-liner. With usually 5 crew on board.

That was an other 5 day fun trip with Esther the Car.

 She drove us comfortable 1100 K and boy,  

did we sleep well.

Salute.