An Enchanting Star Sand Beach
Following my previous blog post Rabbit Island , we remain in Japan to discover an enchanting star sand beach. It’s Hoshizuna-no-Hama (which literally means “star sand beach” ) , in Japan's Okinawa prefecture, and if you l ook closely, you’ll see that the sand of this beach is very special: the sand grains really are stars! According to a local legend these tiny star creatures are the offspring of the North Star and Southern Cross. It was said that their children were born in the sea of Okinawa, but a serpent swallowed them leaving only their skeletons behind. See also Touching a rainbow The truth is that these unique grains are not really sand but actually the exoskeletons of tiny unicellular organism, called Foraminifera that live among the sea grass. Their exoskeleton (or shell) is shaped like a star with 5 or 6 pointed spines that help them, move from one place to another. When they die, they leave their star shaped shells behind to be