During the summer holiday in 2017, we visited our good friends, Lauren and Brittany, on their beautiful Island home, Suo-Oshima. We last visited the island in autumn, and it was a nice enough place. However, summer is the season for Suo-Oshima! The sea was glittering and the mountains were lush. It looked like the most perfect place to live.

We spent the Saturday enjoying a local farmer’s market and BBQ on the beach. Dan and I finally realised a dream and cooked a fresh whole fish, successfully, on a BBQ. It was a real life win! Apart from how gross the fish eye goes when it is being cooked…I mean really nasty…but hey, the flesh tasted goooood!

I also became something of a water baby. I realised that I love the sea! When it is calm and warm, me and the sea are good friends. It was so relaxing swimming back and forth and feeling the cool water take away the hot heat of the day. I loved it! The evening was spent enjoying some karaoke – now there was no infamous ‘Chandelier’ moment, but Dan did treat us all to a solo of some boy-man singer he’s been listening to on YouTube…Charlie someone or other. That was pretty special in so many ways…

The next day we continued our attempts to seem natural around all this glorious nature and went paddle boarding! I now understand why surfers are so ripped…it was hard. Work.That. Core. We really enjoyed paddling about to another beach further up the coast and trying out something new. It felt like we were on some tropical island holiday somewhere, rather than just up the road in our lovely prefecture.

It was a brilliant weekend of firsts; Dan’s first solo, my first ocean swim of the year, and paddle boarding for the first time. Thanks to our hosts for sorting out something so fun!