Oct 14, 2014 - 1 min read

Gunkanjima Perspective - No. 1

Virile 'Battleship Island' floating in the ocean

By Masayoshi Hirose

Community writer

Translated by Takako Sakamoto

Community writer

The whole shape of Gunkanjima is now unveiled in front of my eyes. It surely looks like a battleship

At 2 p.m. we will finally land on Gunkanjima. The weather is fine, but how high will the waves get...

As soon as your boat departs from Nagasaki Seaside Park, you'll see the docks of Nagasaki Shipyard of Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, a symbol of the maritime city Nagasaki

On the way to Gunkanjima, you can see Kaminoshima Church in the center of Kaminoshima Island (left). A statue of the Virgin Mary is watching over our safe voyage

Despite the fine weather, the sea was rough and my boat went up and down

Clusters of uninhabited buildings on the island

Amazingly, they built Japan's first large concrete buildings in 1916 here on the far west island

On the north side of the island miners' residences still stand uninhabited

The silhouetted Gunkanjima in B & W viewed from southeast

On the left is the isolation ward of Hashima Hospital

On New Year's Day this year, I landed on Hashima Island, which is commonly known as 'Gunkanjima, the Battleship Island', by speed boat that departed from the port of Nagasaki in the afternoon.

Since this island is located in the outer sea, waves are high and rough at times and ships to the island are often canceled. But fortunately on the New Year's Day that we went the ship was able to depart! How lucky we were! However, the ship we took was small - capacity was only 100 passengers. It SWAYED and ROLLED and about ten passengers became seasick. I highly recommend that you take medicine for seasickness before boarding a ship to Gunkanjima Island. The Japanese government recently decided to support the application of this island for World Heritage designation. Since I'm a fan of 'ruins', Gunkanjima truly fascinated me!

Undersea Coal Mine Island, 'Gunkanjima' 1. Gunkanjima Perspective - No. 1 2. Ruins on Gunkanjima - No. 2 3. Gunkanjima: Undersea Entrance - No. 3