Shiraishi

We had a really nice weekend getaway to the beach on Shiraishi island with some of the other teachers in our building. We stayed at the International Villa, which is a house that the city has renovated and rents out only to foreigners. The house was really nice and had a great view out over the water.
I enjoyed walking along the beach Saturday as the tide was going out because there were so many interesting creatures. The tide went out quickly and the beach was bumpy, so it formed some little tide pools. There were crabs running around everywhere, sea cucumbers, jelly fish (which did keep us from going swimming), lots of mysterious little guys that I couldn't identify, and starfish. I've never seen so many live starfish. It was neat. In fact, they were all over the beach after the tide went out. I was worried that they were going to dry out and die so I started picking them up and carrying them out into the water. I rescued at least 30 starfish, and on one trip I was carrying 18 at once. They were varying sizes, the largest about the size of my hand, all of the way down to ones no larger than a quarter.