I’m staring at the large rump of a water buffalo and questioning why I’d wanted the front seat in the big cart. I’m on the little island of Taketomi, just 10 minutes by a fast ferry from Ishigaki, way down south in the prefecture of Okinawa but still a 50-minute flight from it. This is what people come to the island for, to ride in cart pulled by a water buffalo through a scenic village of glowing white sand streets and dusky gray coral-cobble walls. Tourists also come for the nice beaches and some good snorkeling. There’s no dive shop, says a hotel clerk, but there is a guy who rents out his equipment. We pass a few tanks standing up inside someone’s yard.
Our cart driver speaks no English so my guide Hiromi has to translate his stories. Akiko is our water buffalo today, and she is 18 years old in human years (6 in water buffalo years). She just had a baby and we see her over one of the walls as we pass a sort of stables/yard. That’s one enormous baby.
Akiko is a natural, says the driver. He doesn’t even have to direct her; she knows the route. And she’s never bumped one of the coral walls despite the length of the cart behind her and the narrow spaces at intersections. Pretty impressive as she digs in and makes a wide farmer’s turn to make it without a scratch.
And most of the view out the front is her massive rear end.

We are cart #2. There are perhaps 10 from this company, and another company besides. We crissc...