10 Best Places to Go Diving in Okinawa
What are the Most Popular Dive Sites in Okinawa?
You should really add the best places to go diving in Okinawa to your bucket list. If you’re a scuba enthusiast who favours diverse underwater landscapes teeming with marine life, this is ideal for your next holiday. The least populated of Japan’s main islands, Okinawa boasts a wealth of idyllic atolls that are home to East Asia’s most magical creatures including humpback whales, hawksbill turtles and manta rays.
If you’re seeking a sophisticated scuba challenge, then explore Okinawa’s underwater caves or visit a sunken WWII battleship now resting on the ocean floor. You will enjoy swimming with shoals of fish, passing through giant rock formations or marvelling at aquatic stalactites.
1. Kerama Islands
The jewel of the Japanese diving scene
Ideal para: Aventura, Foto
A subtropical archipelago 32 km southwest of Okinawa, the Kerama Islands are renowned for their tantalising blue-green waters, powdery white-sand beaches and humpback whale migrations that take place every winter. During the warmer months, visitors flock here to experience some of the best scuba diving in all of Japan, in mysterious underwater caves and breath-taking coral kingdoms.
Head to Ijyakajya for manta rays and sea turtles, Nishibama for scorpionfish and yellow-flanked snapper and Aharen Lighthouse on Tokashiki Island for caverns that glow blue in the sunlight. The city of Naha offers several tour boats that venture to this aquatic haven including Joy Create Okinawa and Marine House SEASIR.
Kerama Islands
2. Miyako Islands
A stunning scuba sanctuary
Ideal para: Aventura, Viagens alternativas
An amazing destination for underwater cave exploration, Japan’s Miyako Islands are not for the faint-hearted because most sites are boat-entry dives that require an advanced licence. If you’re up for the challenge, you can swim through a narrow tunnel to the cavern of Satan’s Palace where you’ll meet yellowfin goatfish, moontail bullseye, long-legged lobsters and amethyst anthias.
One of the region’s most exciting dive spots is Antoni Gaudi, named after the celebrated Spanish architect, for its amazing geological arches that appear as silhouettes in the sunlight. Alternatively, visit Tori-ike, a shimmering tunnel that connects the East China Sea with a cobalt-hued sinkhole. In folklore, it’s rumoured to have harboured a seductive mermaid who’d been imprisoned by humans.
Miyako Islands
3. Yaeyama Islands
Remote archipelago renowned for its sea life
Ideal para: Aventura, Casais, Foto
Long considered a diving paradise thanks to its exceptional number of scuba sites, at Yaeyama Islands you might encounter barracudas, manta rays and shoals of oriental butterflyfish. For a more unusual adventure, visit Taketomi Submarine Hot Spring for its gushing thermal jets. It’s a great place for beginners with its depth of 20 metres.
If you’re seeking an easy-access snorkelling spot, head to Nishibama Beach on Hateruma Island for crystal-clear water, sugar-white sand and an enchanting wealth of marine life, including stripey sea snakes and graceful green turtles. Situated on the southeasterly shore of Ishigaki Island, Shiraho Reef is home to the largest collection of blue-hued coral in the Northern Hemisphere. To see it is to believe it.
Yaeyama Islands
4. Iriomotejima Island
Pristine natural playground in Iriomote-Ishigaki National Park
Ideal para: Aventura, Viagens alternativas
Part of the Yaeyama archipelago, far-removed Iriomotejima deserves its own special mention due to its flotillas of endangered sea turtles and its much-deserved status as a World Natural Heritage site. Here, the reefs are home to rainbow runners, bluefin trevally, tiger sharks and psychedelic coral gardens, making them a haven for conservationists, as well as avid macro photographers.
Scuba tour company Unarizaki, which boasts over 30 years of experience, charters boats to hard-to-reach places that divers dream about. Venture with them to Ogan, an uninhabited island a short ride from the Iriomote coast, for isopora coral, colossal underwater rock formations and shoals of shimmering fish including blackfin barracuda.
Iriomotejima Island
5. Cape Manza
Home of Japan’s famous Blue Cave
Ideal para: Aventura, Foto, Viagens alternativas
A ruggedly picturesque rock formation set on Okinawa’s western coast, Cape Manza casts its gaze over the dramatic East China Sea. It offers an unforgettable scuba diving experience only metres from its cliff face. Discover a unique underwater terrain with a diverse collection of marine creatures including pygmy seahorses, sea moths and kaleidoscopic nudibranchs.
Intrepid divers can’t miss the Manza Dream Hole: a 23-metre vertical drop into a pitch-black cavern which is met on the other end by lapis-coloured waters and a garden of beautiful fan corals. You can explore Cape Manza from the comfort of a chartered boat or by walking into the ocean using an Underwater Scooter.
Localização: Onna, Kunigami District, Okinawa 904-0411, Japan
Cape Manza
6. USS Emmons (Kouri Island)
A difficult but dazzling dive
Ideal para: Aventura, Viagens alternativas, História
The USS Emmons is the underwater wreckage of an American Gleaves-class destroyer, which was sunk off the coast of Kouri Island by Japanese Kamikazes during WWII. Today, divers can explore this historic site, which lies at depth of 40 to 50 metres, while being greeted by bat fish, glass fish and nudibranchs, the world’s most flamboyant sea slug.
While many dream of visiting this famous sunken ship, only advanced deep divers are permitted to do so due to the depth of the wreckage and the ocean’s strong currents. A range of tour operators offer trips to this relic from the Okinawa mainland including Aloha Divers, Piranha Divers and the PADI 5-star Okidivezone.
Localização: Japani, 〒905-0406 Okinawa, Kunigami District, Nakijin, Kouri, 島
USS Emmons (Kouri Island)
7. Minna Island
Hidden hideaway only 15 minutes from the mainland
Ideal para: Aventura, Casais, Foto
One of Okinawa’s lesser-known beauty spots, Minna Island is a crescent-shaped sliver of golden sand and aquamarine sea that can be reached via ferry from Motobu Port. Few people venture here, making it an excellent place to spend a day diving in unspoiled sites like Labyrinth and Lighthouse.
Suitable for both beginners and professionals, Minna’s reefs are abundant with mesmerising table corals, colourful clownfish, graceful manta rays and flotillas of sea turtles. For something completely different, scuba dive at Portside, an underwater kingdom just moments from the marina, where expansive fields of ribbon eels emerge from the seabed.
Minna Island
8. Maeda Point-Blue Cave
A real-life aquarium
Ideal para: Aventura, Viagens alternativas
Considered by some to be the best diving site in Okinawa, Maeda Point-Blue Cave transfixes with its sapphire water, backlit by sunlight, bright-white calcareous floor and outstanding visibility. The light intensifies during sunrise, making the blue illumination particularly vibrant, so get there early to make the most of it.
Access the cave from a stretch of rocky shoreline via the Maeda Misaki car park; descend a flight of 90 stairs to dive straight into the water. When you’re inside its cathedral, get up close and personal with eclectic resident species like blotcheye soldierfish, scissortail sergeants, Ryukyu sweepers and brassy chubs.
Localização: 469-1 Maeda, Onna, Kunigami District, Okinawa 904-0417, Japan
Maeda Point-Blue Cave
9. Kume Island
Pacific Ocean paradise
Ideal para: Casais, Luxo, Foto
Volcanic Kume Island is a living treasure box of emerald hills and white sand beaches edged by turquoise water and multicolour reefs. A 30-minute flight from Naha, visitors are drawn here for the snorkelling experiences off the Hatenohama sandbar, as well as scuba diving further out to see the underwater rock formations.
The island’s Shichugama site features an L-shaped cave that turns cerulean in the sun, while Umagai boasts a dramatic reef wall that’s home to redfin anthias and paper scorpionfish. We love Tonbara for its dazzling array of larger creatures, including humpback whales and spotted eagle rays.
Kume Island
10. Cape Hedo Dome
Extraordinary dive site that’s only accessible under the water
Ideal para: Aventura, Foto
Towards the northernmost point of Okinawa you’ll find Cape Hedo Dome, a humungous limestone air pocket that’s known for its deep blue water, human-sized corals, stalactites and stalagmites. To tackle this aquatic challenge, you’ll need to be an open-water certified diver with solid buoyancy control, as the current in the cave can be rather strong.
Travel to this enigmatic spot with a tour group like Okidivezone who’ll whisk you away on a chartered boat after picking you up from your hotel. Once inside the cave, you can swim with eagle rays, lionfish, lobsters and barracuda before venturing further into the chamber to marvel at its many rock forms.
Localização: Hedo, Kunigami, Kunigami District, Okinawa 905-1421, Japan
Cape Hedo Dome
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