Kohama Island

Okinawa, Japan · Remote island, Sea / Beach

Half an hour by boat from Ishigaki, and the island almost nobody sleeps on even though you can: there are six places to stay, and two of them are resorts that between them take up, according to one source, close to a fifth of the island. What made it famous in Japan was a television series: NHK filmed Churasan here in 2001, and people still come to see the straight road between cane fields that served as the walk to school. Worth knowing that the viewpoint named after the series sits on a private ranch and has been closed since February 2012, so nobody goes looking for it. What there is instead: a banyan grove some three hundred years old, protected by the town since 1976, a dozen-odd trees whose roots swallow the exposed limestone; a viewing platform shaped like a giant manta ray looking out to Iriomote; a beach five minutes from the port that islanders do not call by its name on the map; and the southwesternmost golf course in Japan. And something the brochure does not show: the island's three rites, the bon, the kitsugan and the tanadui, have been designated an important intangible folk cultural property by the state since 2007, all three together as a single property, and they run on the lunar calendar.

The essentials

Getting there

Ferry — You come by fast boat from the island terminal at Ishigaki port in twenty-five to thirty minutes, and also from Ohara port on Iriomote in about thirty: that second route is what lets you fit the island into a Yaeyama loop without going back to Ishigaki. And here is this destination's awkward gap, said plainly: the two ferry companies serving Yaeyama do not allow automated reading of their websites, so this guide has not been able to verify the timetable, the fare, or how many sailings there are a day. All the tourism association publishes is the journey time. You check it at the terminal window, which is where each company sells its tickets. One warning that one of the resorts does publish is worth taking seriously: miss the last boat and you do not reach the island, so book your flight with that in mind. On the island there are hills, and the association itself recommends a scooter or a car over a bicycle if you do not trust your legs; there is a hire place for cars, scooters and bikes fifty metres from the port, and a sightseeing bus that leaves from the port itself and takes in the drama locations and the viewpoints, though neither publishes prices. The small guesthouses handle transfers differently: one collects you at the port, one does it if you tell them your departure time from Ishigaki, one only drives you to its own restaurant, and the whole-house rental collects between one and four in the afternoon and drops off before eleven. Both resorts offer transfers by arrangement. There is no airport and no high school on the island, and some two kilometres of the Yonara channel separate it from Iriomote.

Frequently asked questions about Kohama Island

What to do in Kohama Island: 12 activities

• Three rites, one designated property, all on the lunar calendar 4 h only lunar dates (August-November)

  The best thing on this island is not in the brochure. Its three rites have been designated an important intangible folk cultural property by the state since 7 March 2007, and all three are designated together, as a single property: the bon, the kitsugan and the tanadui. A village preservation society looks after them, and the designation criteria say they qualified for showing the process by which performing arts change and for their local character. The kitsugan is the big one: four days beginning on the day of the boar in the eighth or ninth lunar month, to give thanks that the year's prayers were answered and to ask abundance of the next. The second day is the strong one and it happens in the sacred grove of Kahoniwan, in the god's courtyard: two neighbourhoods, north and south, make the circuit of the ring, the lion dance, the stick dance, and then, on a stage some four metres by five, more than twenty dances and comic plays. The bon runs from the 13th to the 16th of the seventh lunar month, and what happens is that a group of chanters goes house to house, every house in the village, and performs in each courtyard. The tanadui is two days of the ninth or tenth lunar month, sung so that the rice seed laid in the seedbed will prosper. Two things before you go. One: this is not the famous Taketomi tanadui, which is a different rite and is also in this guide. Two: the official records give no common-calendar dates, only lunar ones; the tourism association published 21 November for the 2026 kitsugan, but that is a single source. And no source consulted says whether you may attend or photograph: what they do is refer you to the municipal board of education, and that is exactly what to do before turning up.

• Five snorkelling courses, a boat outfit from 1981 and an island nobody explains 4 h booking

  There are three outfits that take people out on the water and they are worth telling apart. The veteran opened in 1981, says it was the one that found this area's swimming spots, has five boats and runs snorkelling, try-dives, boat fishing and whole-boat charter to tour the surrounding islands. The second does snorkelling only, with five courses and small groups, and it is the only place on the island with a jet blade; it opens from eight in the morning to ten at night and closes on scattered days. The third specialises in one thing: landing on the island called Maboroshi, with short trips, same-day booking, no gear of your own needed and no need to swim. And here is the honest part: none of the sources consulted explains what that island is, which port the trip leaves from, or what it costs. It is named everywhere and described nowhere, so this guide says the service exists and does not invent the place. The other two publish neither prices nor durations.

• The banyan grove that eats the rock 1 h

  At Kokibaru there are a dozen-odd banyan trees that the town designated a natural monument on 15 July 1976, and which are reckoned at some three hundred years old. What you come to see is what the roots do: the limestone surfaces here in enormous blocks, and the roots creep over them until they have swallowed them, while the branches shoot off in every direction. The source calls it a mysterious landscape and it is not overstating. A boardwalk runs through it, so there is no need to step among the roots. No source consulted gives opening hours, a price, exactly how to get there from the port, or whether there is parking; nor do they give the trees' height or an exact count, only that dozen-odd.

• The resort named after the Southern Cross, and the last-boat warning 3 h booking

  It is named after the Southern Cross in the local language and bills itself as the southernmost beach resort in Japan. It has three separate pools and a shallow beach in front, an open-air bath, five restaurants and bars, a spa and a sauna, and in July it opened eight villas with private pools looking across to Iriomote. It does not publish a total room count: it lists them by type, from villa down through a sixty-square-metre suite, and its own site contradicts itself on the year it reopened after refurbishment, so that date is not given here. What it does publish, and it is the most useful practical advice on the whole island, is the boat warning: miss the last afternoon sailing and you do not reach Kohama, so book the Ishigaki flight with that in mind. They store luggage free at their office in the Ishigaki terminal, nine to six, which solves arrival day. And they warn that if the return boat is full it can be thirty or forty minutes to the next one.

• The sugar road, and the argument over whether there is still sugar 1 h

  A straight road between fields with the sea at the end of it, the image the island is sold with. It is called the sugar road because there were cane fields on both sides, and in the series Churasan it served as the walk to school. On whether the cane is still there the sources disagree, and both versions are given here: the tourism association and the town hall still write that the cane fields stretch away on either side, in the present tense, while another source says the cane fields have shrunk and pasture has grown, because what this place lives on now is tourism and cattle. What does not change is that it is better on a bicycle than in a car, and that at night, with no street lights, the association says the Milky Way shows well. No source publishes how long it is or exactly where it runs from and to.

• A viewing platform shaped like a giant manta 1 h

  The fisherman's park has a giant manta ray that serves as the island's landmark, and it is worth clarifying what it is because no guide explains it: it is a viewing platform shaped like a manta, not a free-standing sculpture and not a slide. From the top you take in the fishing hamlet of Kubazaki at a glance, and Iriomote on the other side. Below there is a broad lawn for lying down and looking at the sea, and playground equipment, though the source does not say what. They publish no hours and no price, and from what one reads neither is needed.

• Four small guesthouses, and one twenty-five paces from the water 2 h booking

  Besides the two resorts there are four small places to stay, and they are what makes sleeping here possible without paying resort prices. One, in Kubazaki, the westernmost hamlet, describes itself as the house twenty-five paces from the sea, has five rooms and collects you at the port, ten minutes away by car. Another has six rooms, two Japanese and four Western, all non-smoking with air conditioning, a fridge and a television, and it is the only one that publishes prices: between about five thousand and a little over seven thousand yen depending on whether the bathroom is private or shared and whether breakfast is included, though the page does not say when those rates are from. The third has four rooms, serves breakfast only, checks in at three and out at nine, and will collect you if you tell them your departure time from Ishigaki. The fourth is a whole-house rental with meals made from local produce, collecting between one and four in the afternoon and dropping off before eleven; it publishes neither rooms nor price. There is also a curious fifth option: one of the island's snorkelling outfits rents a villa and gives guests a discount on its trips.

• Sixty suites and the southwesternmost golf course in Japan 4 h booking

  The island's other resort has sixty rooms and all of them are suites, in villa format, with a beach that feels private and a library-café beside the water. And it has attached to it something you would not expect on an island this size: the southwesternmost golf course in Japan. Between this resort and the other one they take up, according to one source, close to a fifth of the island's surface, a figure that explains Kohama better than any description of scenery. There are transfers by prior arrangement and two separate telephone numbers, one for rooms and one for activities. It publishes no prices, nor whether it opens all year, nor the transfer pick-up point, and its own website cannot be read automatically, so all of this comes from the tourism association's listing.

• The 2001 series, and the viewpoint shut for fourteen years 1.5 h

  What put this island on the Japanese map was Churasan, the morning serial NHK broadcast in 2001, and the island still lives off it: the sightseeing bus sells precisely the tour of the locations. The guesthouse that played the inn in the series still has the same sign hanging that appeared on screen, and the sugar road was the walk to school. But there is something to know before going to look for it, because it is still cited in lists of things to see: the viewpoint named after the series, in the west of the island, stands on a private ranch and has been closed since 1 February 2012, under a foot-and-mouth prevention measure. Fourteen years. You do not get in, and the source gives no reopening date.

• The beach the map calls one thing and the island calls another 2 h

  Five minutes' walk from the port, which makes it the island's easiest beach and the plan for the dead hour before the boat. The water is very shallow and the tourism association describes it as a hidden beach with the nature untouched. The detail that explains it is linguistic: Tumaru means sea in the local language, and on the island they do not call this beach that but Yaramasu beach. No source consulted says whether there are facilities, or shade, or a lifeguard, or whether you can simply swim: there is no warning against it, but no confirmation either, and on a shallow, unsupervised beach that is worth knowing beforehand.

• The highest point, and the little anybody publishes about it 1 h

  Odake is the island's highest point and here one has to be honest: it is what everybody names and nobody describes. Two sources give the height and do not agree on the rounding, ninety-nine point eight metres in one and ninety-nine above sea level in the other, and that is where the published material ends. None of the sources consulted says how many steps the climb has, how long it takes, what you see from the top, whether there is a handrail or whether it is always open. For a thirty-minute boat ride whose selling point is scenery, that silence is odd, and it is stated here rather than filled in. What is on record is that the island's sightseeing bus includes the viewpoints on its circuit, so that is how to get there without a car.

• The hire place fifty metres from the port, and the owner who washes the cars 0.5 h

  The island has hills and that decides your day. The tourism association itself recommends a scooter or a car over a bicycle if you do not trust your legs, though the sugar road asks for a bike. Right off the boat, fifty metres to the right, there is a place that hires out cars, scooters and bicycles, and it has a detail that says a great deal about island life: the owner never stops washing the vehicles so the salt does not eat them, and he advertises that as his obsession. It publishes neither prices nor hours. The alternative to driving is the sightseeing bus, which leaves from the port itself and tours the drama locations and the viewpoints with a guide; it does not collect from the accommodation and does not publish a price either, you have to ask. And one snorkelling shop also hires out a small car.

What only happens on specific dates

• Three rites, one designated property, all on the lunar calendar lunar dates (August-November)

Ready-made routes through Kohama Island

Chains well with

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