In case you missed it, here is a link to parts 1 - 3: Part 1 Part 2 Part 3

Monday, August 12 - Lake Tobias Safari Park

On my way back from camping, I met up with my parents, my brother Tony and my kids at this park. We saw longhorn steers and bison.

This is an elk. They are similar to deer, but much bigger.

The safari vehicles were old school buses with the roofs chopped off.

I ate a bison burger for lunch. It was pretty good.

Satoshi enjoyed feeding some ducks alongside some local Amish boys.

We could pet the alligators after the reptile show was finished.

There was a gorgeous sunset that evening. This view is from my parent’s front yard.

Tuesday, August 13 - Escape room: part deux

I did a second escape room at a different place in Lancaster. This time we had 11 people on the squad, including my brother Chris and part of his family, my friends Jerry, John and John’s son Aaron. The theme was Atlantis and we got out in just under 40 minutes. After our escape, we all hung out at a local sports bar for a while.

Wednesday, August 14 - The Franklin Institute

TFI is a long established science museum in downtown Philadelphia. I was probably last there sometime in the 1980s. My brother Mike and my sister-in-law Amy took the day off to join us.

We took in a planetarium show and another show featuring combustion. The boys had a great time running around interacting with all of the exhibits.

The final few days of our trip we tried to spend as much time as we could with our family.

On Friday the 16th, we went up to my brother Chris’s house and had a cookout complete with s’mores around the fire pit.

Ta and Sa had fun hanging out with their cousins.

Saturday, August 17th was my father’s 75th birthday.

It was also the first time during our trip that we got all 4 Fulvio brothers, significant others, and all 6 grandchildren together in the same place.

We had seen everybody separately, but somebody was always missing until that day. We spent the day just hanging out at my parents’ house and my Dad had 2 cakes.

On Sunday we drove to a hotel near Philadelphia airport because our first flight on Monday was at 6:47am, so we got up at 3am .

Overall, we had an awesome trip this year. We did so many fun things and got to see lots of family and friends. I’m already thinking of the trip next year!

Stone money

...and the stone money bank

The Manta Ray Bay Resort (the ship is the hotel restaurant)

Fried breadfruit - better than potato chips!

The Supreme Court of Micronesia

Spider orchids

Pitcher plants

More stone money in front of an old community house

Colonia, the only real town on Yap, as viewed from above

For anyone who’s curious about Micronesia, here are some photos from my trip last month.

For one thing, although the country of Micronesia (or FSM) has its own government, the islands are incredibly diverse and have their own cultures and languages. Throughout Colonia, the capital of Yap State, there seem to be many people from the surrounding islands who come for work. When we went out for snorkeling or other day trips, we always asked the guides about their home life and culture. We found that although most of them were from the state of Yap, they were actually born on different islands. The common language among all the islands is English.

One thing about the Yapese that differentiates them from neighboring islands is their love of dance. Local festivals or ceremonies often incorporate dance performances along with traditional island garb. We didn’t manage to catch any of these dances while we were there, but there’s a big festival every year on March 1st called Yap Day. Maybe next time!

The most well-known feature of Yap is its stone money. These limestone rings originated in Palau hundreds of years ago. The stone was shiny and attractive, so people began bringing it to the island to trade. These days, the giant coins exist all over the island. You can see big ones at the Living Museum and expensive properties, around the island, but even a shack up in the mountains will sometimes have one or two smaller ones. Displaying them is a way to demonstrate wealth and influence.

Finally, I should mention the marine activities. Yap is a paradise for divers. I only went snorkeling, not diving, but the waters there are so clear and beautiful, and the reef is so colorful and vibrant, that I was more than satisfied. I took videos with my phone in a little waterproof bag, but it looks so much better in person.

Go see for yourself! Yap is only a short flight from Guam – an easy trip from Japan.

Kayaking through a mangrove forest

Snorkeling through the reef

Snorkeling with sharks!

In case you missed it, here is a link to parts 1 & 2: Part 1 Part 2

The East Coast Festival of Strenuosity

In 2019 I joined a group called The Strenuous Life - strenuouslife.co . “The Strenuous Life is an online/offline platform that helps members learn new skills, pursue new interests, and improve themselves in body, mind, and spirit.” It’s sort of like Boy Scouts for adults, but more self-directed. When I first joined, I was doing things by myself, but eventually met up with another member, Dustin, who had moved to Japan. Meanwhile in the US, a lot of local and regional groups were springing up and organizing events ranging from one day meet-ups to 5-day long camps. And thus, in 2022, I joined my first “Festival of Strenuosity”. I had such a blast that I returned this year, and all expectations were met and exceeded!

Day One - Thursday Aug. 8th

I drove 3 hours up to Bald Eagle State Park, which is just 30 minutes up the road from Penn State University and State College. The park is huge, with a large reservoir in the middle and campsites on both sides. Being the strenuous type, the group always camps in the “rustic” side, where the campsites have no power, no lights, and just pit toilets and water spigots.

The first night is mostly a time to get your camp set up. There is an opening ceremony where we put the ash from the previous festival into our campfire and we recognize members’ achievements during the precious year, whether that is something inside or outside the program.

Of course, the first night was when hurricane Debbie was scheduled to blow through the area. It was very rainy, but not too windy because our campsites were canopied by thick forest, so other than some pooling water that Dustin trenched out, our tents weathered the storm just fine.

Day Two - Friday Aug. 9

Events at ECFoS are member organized and led. We had about 22 people there this year and there was an amazing variety of members who shared some of their passions and expertise with the group.

Shakespeare in the Park -

Paul is a thespian by trade, and he selected various scenes from Shakespeare plays for us to briefly practice and perform. My group did a scene from the Tempest. It really brought me back to my high school theater days.

Muskets and more -

In the afternoon we moved venue to a State Game Land shooting range north of State College. Various members brought a large variety of handguns and rifles for members to practice with. We had several members with firearms instructor credentials and almost everybody had some level of range experience.

I got to shoot about 16 or 17 different firearms, we did 10 yards for pistols and 20 (25?) yards for rifles. Two highlights for me were shooting Alex’s replica Colonial-era musket and shooting Dustin’s ultra-modern AR. The technology has come a long way.

We had a mid-shoot visit from a Pennsylvania State Game Commission officer, but once we showed our range permits, we continued on with our practice.

The stars at night, are big and bright… -

Around 10:30 pm, we went to a campsite that we specifically rented for the purpose of astronomy, since our usual sites are totally covered by tall trees.

We had a great view of the Perseid meteor shower, as well as Saturn rising from the horizon. We practiced identifying the North Star, Polaris, and how to tell the hour of night using Polaris and the Big Dipper.

The sky was dark enough that we could see the Milky Way with the naked eye, which you need a very low level of light pollution to see.

Day Three - Saturday Aug. 10

Even though our dirt campsites remained a muddy mess, the weather was finally clear and gorgeous all day long. Dustin went full-on camp cook mode with his Dutch oven, making cinnamon rolls in the morning and deep-dish pizza at night. The final night he also made a fabulous peach cobbler that I nearly missed because it got scooped up so fast.

Strenlympics -

We split into teams of four and had a mini competition. The events were: fire building (all the wood and tinder were very wet), fireman’s carry relay, BFR (big freakin’ rock) relay, and a low crawl race. My team finished number one overall, but we only played for pride, no prizes.

We took a break from camp food and had lunch a the local pizza place in Howard.

Clouds and Trees -

We had an excellent talk from Ben about using clouds and wind to help predict local weather and spent some time identifying local trees in the park.

Wood carving -

In the evening, we relaxed around the campfire while doing some wood carving. Micheal brought all of his many tools and wood blocks for everybody. Last time I carved a spoon, this time I worked on a “try stick” which is simply a stick where you practice different wood carving techniques. I practiced rounding one end and squaring the other.

Many serious and absurd conversations were had around the campfire until deep into the night.

Day Four - Sunday Aug. 11

Flag Football -

A fairly official flag football game with real flag belts and field cones. We lost 3-2 (I think) and I got a hard elbow to the head and tweaked a hamstring, but had a great time along the way.

Meshtatic -

It was finally my time to contribute and lead a session. I chose to introduce the group to the LoRa Meshtastic radios that I have been building for the past several months. It’s too long to explain here, but Google it if you are interested. I brought 5 radios and people took turns connecting them to their phones to test out the messaging and gps capabilities. I was pleased with the reception my talk got, because I wasn’t sure if people would be interested in that topic or not.

Martial Arts -

There was a martial arts session mostly run by Chris and Brian, who do BJJ (Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu). They covered some basics like positioning and back control, so we all got to choke each other out.

I contributed by talking about self-defense awareness and covered some very basic Kajukenbo punching, blocking and stances.

The Legalities of Self Defense -

Dustin found the only public power outlets in the park and gave an excellent power point presentation on various aspects of both the criminal and civil ramifications of using force for self-defense. The group had many pertinent questions and opinions on the subject.

The final night we had an “empty your coolers” community cookout at the central campsite fire and a heartfelt closing ceremony, where we received our official 2024 ECFoS patch. Folks who were not leaving super early hung out until we were out of firewood and the fire was down to embers.

Monday morning is just clean up and goodbyes, with promises of gathering again in a year or sooner.

It’s amazing how such a busy event held while roughing it for four nights can make me feel so refreshed and invigorated. I look forward to going again next year!

In case you missed it, here is a link to part 1: Dave's Trip to the USA - Part 1

During my second week in the US, we were a little bit less busy and could relax more overall.

However, on Sunday August 4th, I got up really early to go fishing with one of my friends from high school.

We launched from a beautiful little marina in a small town called Port Deposit, Maryland.

Port Deposit is on the Susquehanna River, that soon connects to the Chesapeake Bay. That bay is really big, about half of the size of the Seto Inland Sea.

My biggest catch of the day, a striped bass. Because of the season, we did catch and release fishing.

On another day, my family stopped by a roadside vegetable stand. There were a lot of fresh veggies, all at very reasonable prices. We bought some corn and some tomatoes.

We made tacos for dinner, using the fresh tomatoes.

We played a word game called Scattergories. The boys did very well, but Satoshi needs to practice his English spelling a bit more…

I went shopping to prepare for my camping trip. Now my hometown’s supermarket has an “Asian food” section. Can you see any familiar products?

Kikkoman sells many different kinds of soy sauce in the US. What do you think of “Sweet Soy Sauce for Rice”?

That’s all for this blog. I will post Part 3 in a few days!

During summer, I originally planned to go to the coastal side of Wakayama. But there was a big earthquake in the Nankai Trough, and it caused a lot of trouble for my travel plans, so I cancelled the trip. But I still wanted to travel somewhere and planned a new trip at the last minute to go somewhere else. I ended up spending four days around Fukuoka, northern Nagasaki and Saga.

Up in north Saga is a city called Karatsu. And even further north is a small port town called Yobuko (呼子). Yobuko has two main tourist attractions. The first is its local fish market that is open almost every morning. The area of Yobuko is well-known for its squid. While there were less stalls and vendors than I expected (we possibly arrived too late), they sold a variety of delicious squid dishes. The best I had were squid dumplings (イカシュウマイ) which I had never eaten before. After trying the squid, I can see why it is so famous. The market also had a retro sweets store. While some of the candy is still sold in supermarkets today, there were many types of candy that are rare and not often found now. Many customers were coming in and talking about how nostalgic the store made them. I was able to buy many kinds of sweets for only around 350 yen.

After enjoying the market, we went to the boat terminal. The terminal has two types of boats that can take you on different experiences. One of the boats is called the Zeela (ジーラ) and is named after a whale. It also has a whale face painted on the front. The reason it is designed as a whale is because it takes passengers out to an island that is shaped like one. There they can go to an underwater observatory on the boat and see many kinds of fish through glass windows underwater. The other boat takes you to the second main attraction of Yobuko. This boat is called the Ikamaru (イカ丸) and is shaped like a squid. The Ikamaru takes passengers to a place called Nanatsugama(七ツ釜). Nanatsugama are seven uniquely formed caves in the mountainside by the ocean. The rock shapes are very distinct and have been shaped by the strong ocean waves. It was difficult to take good pictures in the bright weather, but it looked beautiful. There is also a park above the caves where many tourists go to take pictures. So, there are two different ways to experience and enjoy the caves.

Saga is not such a famous prefecture; however, I want to visit every prefecture in Japan, so I decided to go there. If you can find a chance to go, Yobuko is a fun day trip, and it is not too far from Fukuoka city. The squid there is some of the best in Japan.

I took my sons Tatsuki and Satoshi to Pennsylvania in the US for three weeks during our summer break. We stayed at my parents’ house in Quarryville. We were very busy having fun every day. The weather was mostly good, it was cooler than Okayama and much less humid. There were some thunderstorms on a few days and a hurricane passed by, but the winds were not strong when it finally reached us.

Here is a quick look at all of the fun that we had during the first week and a half:

My brother, his family, and some of my aunts and uncles came to visit us in Quarryville.

The weather was nice, so we all spent time visiting in my parents’ backyard.

We went bowling at my parents’ retirement community. They still live at home, but participate in social activities there.

I tried pickleball for the first time. It is like tennis and table tennis combined. It was fun, I would like to try it again.

We went to a huge indoor water park called Great Wolf Lodge. They had a lot of slides and a wave pool.

We played miniature golf at the water park. Everything was inside so that families can go there in the summer heat and the winter cold.

Me and the boys did the high ropes course there, too. I could pass most of the obstacles without relying on my safety harness.

I did some Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu training with one of my old high school friends. He is a very experienced martial artist.

We did an escape room. The theme for this escape room was the American Revolution (around 1777 in this case). We had to save the American flag from the British forces. We barely escaped the room after 58 minutes. The time limit was 1 hour, so it was very close.

Some evenings we just relaxed at home and played card games, such as Uno.

We went “tubing”. Tubing is when you float down a stream on an innertube. This tubing trip took about 1 hour and 45 minutes. When we finished, a small bus took us back to the starting area.

There were some fast sections of water, but mostly it was nice and slow. Two of my brothers and an old friend joined us. It was great to chat to my family and friend as we floated down the river and cooled off.

After tubing, we enjoyed “Jimmy Juice” (a local cocktail) and some junk food.

We watched a local professional wrestling event. I got to hold the championship belt before the event started.

The venue for the pro wrestling was unique. It was outdoors at a minor league baseball stadium. It would have been a great place to watch, but unfortunately, it was a bit rainy that night. The wrestlers didn’t give up and performed in the rain. We were feeling quite wet and cold by the end, but they put on a surprisingly good show for the fans that stayed through the bad weather.

The final match for the Heavyweight Championship was the best one. Tatsuki and Satoshi asked me a lot of questions about wrestling because it was the first time for them to see it.

Well, that was our first 10 days in America. I’ll add more blog posts in the coming days.