Nagasaki's Ghost Island Gunkan-Jima - Japan at Cherry Blossom 2023 - 18
02.04.2023 - Nagasaki's Ghost Island Gunkan-Jima
Weather: mostly sunny
Walking distance: 10.5 km
Today a special and somewhat unusual destination is on the agenda. Together with another guy from the group I'm visiting Ghost Island or Gunkan-Jima Island [↗] as it's called by the tour operators. It is part of an overarching World Heritage Site on Japanese industrial history. The James Bond movie “Skyfall" [↗] was also partly filmed here.
It’s a small island from where the Japanese built underwater coal mines starting in 1887. The island reached a peak population of more than 5000 people in 1959, which equals 83,500 people/km². Just for comparison: Mumbai, the densest populated city was at 29,650 in 2006.
In the mid 70’s the mines were closed and the buildings were left for good. For 30 years the island was left alone. Only in 2001 did Mitsubishi Materials hand over the island to Takashima which belongs to Nagasaki nowadays. Travel to Ghost Island was finally reestablished in 2009.
When I was looking for possible places to visit in Nagasaki at home, this place was at the top of my list. But as it was said that reservation is a must and the descriptions on how to get it was pretty vague, I was not very optimistic that I would be able to make it happen.
We take the first shuttle bus at 8am from the hotel to the train station, as we were told to be at the ticket counter of the cruise company between 8:15am and 8:30am. We arrive on time and there are long queues everywhere but at our booth.
So we show the reservation we got yesterday, hand over the signed declaration on what we must not do on the island, and our passports that they want to copy. We pay some 4000 Yen (deducting the voucher) and get in return two tickets (one for the vessel and one for the island), a batch in purple, and a brochure. Then we were told to go to Pier 8 and that boarding is at 8:40am.
A long line of people is waiting at the pier but everybody has a blue batch and so we are not sure if we are right. We go to the front of the line and try to ask but even with the help of Google Translate, no one understands us. So we just give it a try and yes, we're right. As far as we can see we are the only Western tourist on board and as we were told before all explanations will be in Japanese or Chinese.
The boat seems to be more or less sold out and we are surprised how easily we got our reservation yesterday. It's a nice boat ride through the harbor and over the sea. On the island, passengers are divided into three groups and you are not allowed to leave the groups. The stay on the island is about 30 minutes, but only 3 sightseeing points, all more or less in the same area, can be visited. You can't get near or even inside the buildings at all for security reasons.
I expected a little more, but so it is just a nice cruise with a short visit. The island was only 10% of the total price anyway, so maybe I should have just managed my expectations better.
The tour takes 2.5 hours in total so we're back at the harbor at 11:30am. The question is what to do now. I'm not interested to visit the Peace Park in the northern part of town. So I go to the nearest department store and as all restaurants have a waiting line, I buy a sushi takeaway in one of the specialized shops in the basement. This one is much better than the ones of 7/11 and alike. I grab a coffee at Lawson and go for a picnic in the harbor park like a lot of locals do. While I eat, I watch the families and their kids play baseball.
Afterwards, I walk a bit through the old town including Chinatown and find by chance the restaurant where we will have our farewell dinner today. It is not super interesting here and after 2.5 weeks in Japan I also have no desire to walk a long distance to see another temple. I'm back at the hotel shortly after 2pm.
At 6:40pm we take the shuttle to the obligatory farewell dinner. Since the plans for Osaka on the last evening didn't work out we do it here in Nagasaki. It's quite difficult to organize something like that here in Japan as restaurants are usually very small and don't have bigger tables or even separate rooms. But our guide knew this Chinese restaurant that is able to handle a group of 21 people.
In fact, they have specialized in this kind of business. The tables are good for 6 to 7 people and there are at least two more tour groups with us.
