any/all things Okinawa

[captainspoke]

Since this came up in the weekly blog, it may be easier to comment/share okinawa stuff here. I've been to ishigaki a couple times (and once to each taketomi and iriomote). Also to the main island a few times. I'd like to try amami at some point. Some of the bookmarks I had are now dead, but here are some links that still seem to be active:

https://www.zamamienglishguide.com

http://joshneebs.blogspot.com/2015/05/f ... amami.html

http://www.oki-islandguide.com/areaguide/iheya-island

[RetireJapan]

Really recommend Miyako after our trip.

My wife also liked it (she has been to Amami and Zamami, said Miyako was the best for snorkelling). Bonus: no mosquitos, due to something about the water

[banders]

25 years ago my wife and I took a day trip to Tinian for snorkelling when we were sojourning in Saipan. Neither of us had been snorkelling before but we bought some equipment and didn't expect much. It turned out to be one of the most amazing experiences of my life. Walk into the sea and the coral started a few metres out. Put your face into the water and it was like entering a rainbow world with all the tropical fish. Being careful not to cut our stomachs too much on the coral, we pushed out and saw the coral suddenly sink away to the depths. Then it would rise up again as though we'd flown onto a new city. We saw a turtle, too...and even a plane wheel, presumably from when the American base was there.

I'd love to experience that again, but I'm getting too old to jump from a boat to see it. Are there any places in Okinawa we can experience that again? All that colour? Tinian is the same latitude as Manila, so way south of any Okinawan islands, so maybe not.

[Deep Blue]

You don't even need to go to Okinawa. There is great diving and snorkelling on the Izu penisular. Before children came along I enjoyed a few hundred scuba dives, probably of which half were on the Izu penisular and a few in Chiba for good measure. Okinawa is fantastic and you don't get the warm white sand super visibility dives up here but you can still enjoy soft corals, plenty of tropical fish, turtles, sharks and even hammerheads off Shimoda. Plenty of squid, cuttlefish and octopi on almost every dive.

If you are not interested in boat dives, give Doug at Reef Encounters a bell and he can take you for shore dives off Sunabe seawall in Okinawa. If you want to dive a bit closer to home, ping Ben Wouters at Divezone Tokyo.

[RetireJapan]

I'd love to experience that again, but I'm getting too old to jump from a boat to see it. Are there any places in Okinawa we can experience that again? All that colour? Tinian is the same latitude as Manila, so way south of any Okinawan islands, so maybe not.

My wife and I had some great beach dives on Miyako. If you go to the south-east beaches there is coral right off the beach, turtles, fish. I came face to face with a large eel and just hung out there looking at it for a while.

Very much recommend. You can rent equipment there if you don't have your own.

Just make sure you don't touch the coral at all, as doing so kills it.

[banders]

Nice, thanks!

[VG1]

Really recommend Miyako after our trip.

My wife also liked it (she has been to Amami and Zamami, said Miyako was the best for snorkelling). Bonus: no mosquitos, due to something about the water

I just came back from Miyako, where I spent 5 days. It's a really nice place, indeed. The good surprise was that there were few tourists there. We rented a car and drove around the four islands and hardly crossed paths with any other vehicles. The beaches are beautiful.

[TJKansai]

We enjoyed snorkling on the north coast of Ishigaki (Yonehara) so much we went back 3 times. Challenging to get to the edge of the reef at low tide, but well worth it.

[TJKansai]

You don't even need to go to Okinawa. There is great diving and snorkelling on the Izu penisular. Before children came along I enjoyed a few hundred scuba dives, probably of which half were on the Izu penisular and a few in Chiba for good measure. Okinawa is fantastic and you don't get the warm white sand super visibility dives up here but you can still enjoy soft corals, plenty of tropical fish, turtles, sharks and even hammerheads off Shimoda. Plenty of squid, cuttlefish and octopi on almost every dive.

If you are not interested in boat dives, give Doug at Reef Encounters a bell and he can take you for shore dives off Sunabe seawall in Okinawa. If you want to dive a bit closer to home, ping Ben Wouters at Divezone Tokyo.

Any recommended outfits around Izu?

[Deep Blue]

Ben organizes Izu dives all through the summer, different sites each weekend. I used to dive with my friends mostly and just used whichever dive shop was local to the vicinity we were diving in. There are generally much of a muchness… two guided dives a day. Apart from Mikimoto, all the dives are either easy beach entry/exit or local fishing boats dropping you in no-current areas so very easy diving.

My favourite site is Izu Oceanic Park (east coast) which has a dive centre on site. If it’s windy the entry can be a bit rough (gear up on shore then shuffling in along a rope until it’s deep enough to submerge) but this is a great site with lots of life and rare in that you can get deep quite close to shore if you want to.

There is a wreck (albeit a fairly boring one) at Atami, and Futo and Ito also fun dives on that side.

On the west side Ozesaki is very easy beach diving with muck on one side and corals on the other side (bit of a current).

Finally I’d be remiss not to mention the hammerhead dives at Shimoda, but these are blue water dives with strong currents so you need to be a confident diver (I’d recommend 100+ dives) and able to shoot a balloon as it’s likely you’ll get split up from any group. But hammerheads are worth it!