Today was the official start of the Monsoon season where we can expect plenty of heavy rain and high humidity. I certainly noticed the humidity. After an early evening jog, I came back as soaked in sweat as I can ever remember. At first I thought it was a cool evening.
To avoid the mozzies I kept away from the river bank and ran to the city centre and back out and finally through the Samorai district main road. Some old guy was approaching from behind on a bike and seemed to take a long time to catch me. So when he passed I spent the last kilometer or so of my run trying to catch him!
In the end, he lost me but it was a good way to finish the run and useful practice for the 10Km race I have entered in the Noto Peninsula on 18th July. This is connected with my weighloss and fitness regime which I am coving in a separate blog over at Weight Loss Tips
Here are pictures from the 55th HyaKuMaN GoKu festival which is remembering the Samurai lord who lived in the castle around 500 years ago. The family was wealthy and worth 1 million (HyaKuMaN) bushels of rice.
Miss HyaKuManGoKu finalists: 
Fireman showing off. They used to climb the ladders during fires in the village so they could signal to each other their location. 
The Samurai lord’s enterage of guards, family, wife and troops 
Today was weird, I came across 2 of the biggest insects I ever saw before.
In the morning I was waiting to cross a road and some creature came buzzing towards me in the air. I ducked and dived to avoid it but the thing landed in the groin area of my shorts. It was big with long tentacles, unlike anything I had seen before. I shook it off and it landed on the pavement and I left it alone. I have no idea what it was, a kind of long thin brown insect with 2 long feelers in front of it and the ability to fly.
Next up was a giant wasp in our house in the afternoon. I am used to wasps that are yellow/black and around 1cm in body length, but this one was like something out of Jurrasic park! I was actually scared of it because of the thought of how much poison it might have if it bit me. I would say the body length was around 1 inch (~2.5cm) as it was resting on a wall. Luckily, by the time my wife came along with a brush to remove it, it seemed to have buzzed away.
Today I went over to take some photos of the fish that hang out near a small dam. But the water was more polluted than usual with scum on the surface. The fish seemed to be making a meal of it though. Maybe it was waste water from restaurants? The fish are many years old so they probably contain lots of unpleasant chemicals, so you wouldn’t want to eat these fish.
We went to the beach which is around 27 minutes drive away to see if there were any kinds of water sports going on. I have a windsurf board so wanted to find a good place to use it.
In Japan, we can drive onto the beach and park close to the water. Our car is 4WD which makes this possible too. Much better than in England where I used to have to park well away from the beach and pay for parking and risk getting my car broken into.
At the beach we found surfers, windsurfers and kite boarding. So plenty of action. There were waves, wind and it was warm. So it seems like I found the ideal place to come and windsurf 
