Day 2: Nago Pineapple Park (2 hours) --> Ufuya --> Kouri Island --> Nakijin Castle --> Centurion Hotel Resort Vintage Okinawa
We woke up to a really gloomy day 2 in Okinawa. We found out the night before that the weatherman had forecasted a rainy day with plummeting temperatures. During the time we were there, Okinawan weather was really interesting. I remembered checking prior our trip that the temperature forecast was between 17 to 21 degrees. But the first day when I stepped off the airplane, I started sweating. And on day 2, despite a gloomy start, we still didn't require our jackets or cardigans. However, once it started raining, we were freezing despite being bundled up. I never really knew when to leave my jackets and cardigans alone during the trip.
Anyway, first stop of day: Nago Pineapple Park, a 40 minute drive away from our beach resort.
After parking, our driver directed us to the ticket booth where I exchanged our Okinawa Enjoy Passes for our tickets. Then we went on our second ride of the day and I felt like a kid again!
I mean, we take enough train rides to get around, but it has been a while since I'm on one that looks straight out of a cartoon. And OMG. There's this incessant Japanese tune about pineapple that keeps playing. I really felt like I was in some children's show.
And that's not the last of it. The train brings you to the main attraction building where we started queuing for our third ride of the day. Yup. Another cutesy one. A pineapple cart.
Honestly, the train and cart rides were so cutesy, I feared that this would be a kiddy attraction. Thankfully, it was just the train and cart rides. And in case you didn't realise, getting into the ride itself is a photo point. So if you want the final pictures, make sure you listen when they tell you where to look towards and pose.
And that's the pineapple cart that we got on. I did say cutesy right. My parents were quite impressed with the technology when they realised that the pineapple carts were driverless. The pineapple cart rides are included in the Okinawa Enjoy Pass.
The carts take you on a quick tour around the park and gives you an idea of the park routes. The park actually isn't very big. I'm quite surprised that we took 2 hours to cover the grounds, but we did stop quite a bit for photos and spent some time at the souvenir shop at the end.
There are 3 main segments to Nago Pineapple Park. Once we got off the pineapple cart, we started with the lush greenery of their botanical garden. There's also an aerial footpath that gives an lovely overview of the garden greens.
The garden paths will also lead you to a café where I got a really yummy pineapple soft serve to accompany me on the next segment, the pineapple fields itself.
We got bored of the pineapple fields quickly though. Although the brochure did say that there were about 200 varieties of pineapples that were grown in the park itself, we thought they all kind of looked the same.
So we moved on to the third segment of Nago Pineapple Park, their Dinosaur Adventure Tour. Which is essentially a lot of electronically moving dinosaur models. Kids would love this part of the tour. So did my parents who took quite a number of photos with the dinosaurs.
Those of you who are intending to visit around meal times, there is a restaurant within Nago Pineapple Park. However, as I had planned lunch outside, we headed straight to the souvenir shop.
Actually, the shopping is what I had been looking forward to for this part of the itinerary. Okinawa is also well known for pineapples. Since I'm in a pineapple park, it should be pineapple goodies galore! Heh. I was even crazy enough to match my holiday nails to pineapples.
The shopping definitely did not disappoint. We tasted everything from pineapple castella cake to pineapple cookies, pineapple pie, pineapple cider and even pineapple wine. I really loved the castella cake and the pineapple pie but I could only buy the pineapple cake home. The pineapple pie's expiry date was just too soon. I also contemplated buying one of the pineapple wine because the pineapple shaped bottle was just too pretty. Reason prevailed and I decided to save the luggage space for other things instead.
Don't misplace or throw away your tickets when you get them at admission. They also serve as discount coupons when you shop at the souvenir store! They punch holes in them to show that it's been used. As you can tell, ours are very well utilised.
Just when we thought we were done with the shopping, we walked into a second shop right after passing the restaurant. Yup. We looked some more and bought some more. There are also some food and drink stalls here. We chanced upon a sugar cane drink staff almost at the exit and I had one of the yummiest sugar cane drink ever. It was really refreshing end to our time at Nago Pineapple Park.
Tourist Information
Nago Pineapple Park
Website: https://www.nagopine.com/en/
Address: 1195 Aza Biimata, Nago-shi, Okinawa 905-0005
DID: 0980-53-3659
Opening hours: 9 am to 6 pm, everyday.
We woke up to a really gloomy day 2 in Okinawa. We found out the night before that the weatherman had forecasted a rainy day with plummeting temperatures. During the time we were there, Okinawan weather was really interesting. I remembered checking prior our trip that the temperature forecast was between 17 to 21 degrees. But the first day when I stepped off the airplane, I started sweating. And on day 2, despite a gloomy start, we still didn't require our jackets or cardigans. However, once it started raining, we were freezing despite being bundled up. I never really knew when to leave my jackets and cardigans alone during the trip.
Anyway, first stop of day: Nago Pineapple Park, a 40 minute drive away from our beach resort.
After parking, our driver directed us to the ticket booth where I exchanged our Okinawa Enjoy Passes for our tickets. Then we went on our second ride of the day and I felt like a kid again!
I mean, we take enough train rides to get around, but it has been a while since I'm on one that looks straight out of a cartoon. And OMG. There's this incessant Japanese tune about pineapple that keeps playing. I really felt like I was in some children's show.
And that's not the last of it. The train brings you to the main attraction building where we started queuing for our third ride of the day. Yup. Another cutesy one. A pineapple cart.
Honestly, the train and cart rides were so cutesy, I feared that this would be a kiddy attraction. Thankfully, it was just the train and cart rides. And in case you didn't realise, getting into the ride itself is a photo point. So if you want the final pictures, make sure you listen when they tell you where to look towards and pose.
And that's the pineapple cart that we got on. I did say cutesy right. My parents were quite impressed with the technology when they realised that the pineapple carts were driverless. The pineapple cart rides are included in the Okinawa Enjoy Pass.
The carts take you on a quick tour around the park and gives you an idea of the park routes. The park actually isn't very big. I'm quite surprised that we took 2 hours to cover the grounds, but we did stop quite a bit for photos and spent some time at the souvenir shop at the end.
There are 3 main segments to Nago Pineapple Park. Once we got off the pineapple cart, we started with the lush greenery of their botanical garden. There's also an aerial footpath that gives an lovely overview of the garden greens.
The garden paths will also lead you to a café where I got a really yummy pineapple soft serve to accompany me on the next segment, the pineapple fields itself.
We got bored of the pineapple fields quickly though. Although the brochure did say that there were about 200 varieties of pineapples that were grown in the park itself, we thought they all kind of looked the same.
So we moved on to the third segment of Nago Pineapple Park, their Dinosaur Adventure Tour. Which is essentially a lot of electronically moving dinosaur models. Kids would love this part of the tour. So did my parents who took quite a number of photos with the dinosaurs.
Those of you who are intending to visit around meal times, there is a restaurant within Nago Pineapple Park. However, as I had planned lunch outside, we headed straight to the souvenir shop.
Actually, the shopping is what I had been looking forward to for this part of the itinerary. Okinawa is also well known for pineapples. Since I'm in a pineapple park, it should be pineapple goodies galore! Heh. I was even crazy enough to match my holiday nails to pineapples.
The shopping definitely did not disappoint. We tasted everything from pineapple castella cake to pineapple cookies, pineapple pie, pineapple cider and even pineapple wine. I really loved the castella cake and the pineapple pie but I could only buy the pineapple cake home. The pineapple pie's expiry date was just too soon. I also contemplated buying one of the pineapple wine because the pineapple shaped bottle was just too pretty. Reason prevailed and I decided to save the luggage space for other things instead.
Don't misplace or throw away your tickets when you get them at admission. They also serve as discount coupons when you shop at the souvenir store! They punch holes in them to show that it's been used. As you can tell, ours are very well utilised.
Just when we thought we were done with the shopping, we walked into a second shop right after passing the restaurant. Yup. We looked some more and bought some more. There are also some food and drink stalls here. We chanced upon a sugar cane drink staff almost at the exit and I had one of the yummiest sugar cane drink ever. It was really refreshing end to our time at Nago Pineapple Park.
Tourist Information
Nago Pineapple Park
Website: https://www.nagopine.com/en/
Address: 1195 Aza Biimata, Nago-shi, Okinawa 905-0005
DID: 0980-53-3659
Opening hours: 9 am to 6 pm, everyday.
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