Black Sand Beaches

I am a Florida girl through and through and there is nothing I look forward to more than going to the beach. Faithfully each summer my family and I travel to St.Augustine or Daytona Beach Florida where we stay for a couple of days. I have lifelong memories that I will forever cling to, being with family, laying in the sun, exploring downtown, and laughing at all of our disfunction.

Well now that I am in a new country and with my husband (who is also originally from FL) we decided to start making some of our own summer memories in Japan. We discovered that the beaches here have a much different aesthetic than those we grew up on. Now the further south you go in Japan they do have white sand beaches that most of us would be familiar with, however we are closer to Tokyo so we are in a industrialized area.

The beach we decided to visit is called Fujisawa, Kanagawa, Japan. The beaches in our area are notoriously known for there black sand. Volcanic sand to be exact, were so close to active volcanoes and the sand emulates that of it's ashes. The water itself is rather dark because of the sand being so dark in color. We did notice that the water was not as salty, or sticky, you know visiting any Florida beach that you'll bring home half the beach with you in sand, but the sand here comes right off! I didn't even find traces of the black sand on the towels, I really was shocked and delighted!

Before we made our way onto the beach we decided to try a new restaurant, called Eggs-N-Things. It is a Hawaiian themed restaurant and it is to die for!! Seriously so good, I got the spinach and bacon omelette, and my husband ordered the banana cream pancakes which are served with a mountain of whipped cream! This place deserves a 10/10 I'm sure we will be visiting here again.

Now the ocean, I personally prefer water where I can see what is underneath my feet but here there's no chance that is happening so you just walk by faith! We happened to go to far down the beach so the area that we ended up in was loaded with trash, on the shore, in the water, just everywhere!! I was so dumb founded at how much trash was just thrown around and it didn't seem to phase anyone around us. I was hesitant to step foot in the ocean because of the debris around me but I didn't want to miss out on a new experience. I quickly made my way through the water which actually wound up being very nice.

As I was getting out of the water to dry off, I faced a whole new creature. Apparently jellyfish in Japan are beyond aggressive (which my husband found so funny) I got stung not once, but three times by jellyfish and it stung so bad I really thought something was wrong. Eventually it did go away, but I decided to stay out of the water the rest of the time we were there. My husband also got stung while he was in the water too so they are apparently sting happy.

Beyond the jellyfish and the garbage, the black sand beaches really were exciting. I see the beach as a place of escape and relaxation so I was more than excited to explore. I can't wait to try another beach soon to see what it has to offer!