~3h — the round trip from the gangway, with the 60-minute margin kept aside.
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The water really is that colour — shallow, white-sand-floored and lit from below. You cannot swim: the current is serious and black pearls are farmed in the shallows. Glass-bottom boats are the intended way to see it, and they are worth the fare.
Kabira is the postcard of the Yaeyama islands, and it is the rare famous bay you are not allowed to swim in: the current is strong and the water is a working black-pearl farm. Glass-bottom boats exist for exactly that reason. Michelin's Japan green guide gives it three stars.
Shallow water over white coral sand, with granite islets scattered across it. The colour is not a filter — it is what happens when sunlight passes through two metres of clear water and comes back off white sand.
You cannot swim. The tidal current through the bay is genuinely dangerous, and black pearls are cultivated in the shallows. The glass-bottom boats are the intended way to see it, they run every fifteen minutes or so, and they are worth the fare.
Both pins on one map, so the distance is a fact rather than a feeling.
Counted from the moment you step off the gangway. The hour before all-aboard is not in this bar; it is already set aside.
35 minutes each way is the honest figure for car ~35 min, not the optimistic one. If your ship is late, cut the 1 hr 50 min in the middle. Never cut the hour at the end.
Each of these still lands you back aboard with the hour to spare on a 6-hour stop ashore.
The tidal current through the bay is strong enough to be dangerous, and black pearls are cultivated in the shallows. Glass-bottom boats run instead and are the intended way to see the water. For swimming, Sukuji and Yonehara beaches on the same coast are permitted and close.
By taxi or tour, about thirty-five minutes each way — there is no practical bus for a port-day schedule. Fix your return before you get out of the car, because there is no taxi rank at the bay. Budget about three hours door to door.
Each one is a finished day we have walked and timed, with this stop in it. Read the route rather than assembling it yourself.
Each of these still lands you back aboard with the hour to spare.
4 hr 30 min for bothRound, thin, slightly chewy wheat noodles in a light pork-and-bonito broth, with kamaboko and diced pork belly.
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4 hr 30 min for bothFish in colours that look wrong downstairs, a food court above, and the whole Yaeyama larder in between — island salt, chilli oil in awamori, brown sugar, and dried bonito.
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4 hr 30 min for bothA belt woven in a repeating five-and-four square pattern, traditionally given by a woman to a man.
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