Yaeyama Islands Experience Suggestions

Hi all,

At present, I'm currently planning where to stay for 4 nights in Feb (Yaeyama Islands) and have already been given plenty of suggestions on what to see at the three main islands I'll be visiting through previous posts (Iriomote, Taketomi and Ishigaki).

I'll go through my basics:

Flight from Naha to Ishigaki (9:30 - 10:30AM - Feb 20th)
From from Ishigaki to Naha (10:55AM - 11:50AM - Feb 24th)

My original plan was to spend two nights on Ishigaki and then two nights on Iriomote. However, I'm now considering flipping this catching the 12:30 PM ferry to Ohara port on Iriomote. Hiring a car for 2 nights and leaving on the first boat back to Ishigaki on the 22nd. This should give me 1 1/2 days on Ishigaki (I'm happy to hire a car) and 1 1/2 days on Ishigaki and Taketomi...

Any thoughts or suggestions are more than welcome. I will say that I have travelled around Japan more than most (including locals) but my ferry experience is limited to the Seto Sea and in Northern Hokkaido. Suggestions from people who have been there or people who speak + read the language has always been helpful.....

I'm also happy to hear and reasonably priced accommodation people may have stayed at..... (reasonable is less than 10,000 yen a night for a single person traveling alone - but am slightly flexible if it's exceptional in it's uniqueness)

A few years ago we did a similar trip for 4 days, and based ourselves in Ishigaki. We stayed at Ishigaki Toyoko inns; economical, clean, and location is not bad either ( for single room, very likely you'd get higher floor with sea view). We did not hire car. We found more convenient to join local day tours visiting Iriomote, Taketomi, Kohama and Yubu islands.Those tours are readily available in the ferry terminal, several agents are operating in the same building.

Hmmm... I have not really thought about that. I'm normally quite an independent tourist and I was worried about the tours not running due to it being the middle of winter. I'll do some research and have a think about it....

tours not running due to it being the middle of winter
Don't you worry, with temperature average 20C at that time of the year is nothing close to -10 in Hokkaido. Tours will go on.

It was more that there will be no tourists so they close for the winter (the tours, not the ferries)....

I used Ishigaki dream tours. The manager, Yamada, speaks English well, and here is the contact details:
yamada.yutaka@ishigaki-dream.co.jp
Yamada is a friendly guy, I am sure he will answer your queries regardless you use his service or not.

http://ishigaki-dream.co.jp/languages/e_company.html

More details in their Japanese website:
http://ishigaki-dream.co.jp/tour
http://ishigaki-dream.co.jp/wp-content/uploads/flyer_omote.pdf

We spent 3 days on Iriomote and 3 on Ishigaki in 2009, so probably a lot has changed since then. Definitely loved Iriomote better than Ishigaki. We stayed at a super cheap 1 room hostel-type place since it was Golden Week, and the place we stayed did small tours like snorkling out to the coral island (Barasu or something like that?), and a canoe tour to one of the waterfalls (the tall thin one). Other things, like a boat ride out to the other waterfall and visiting some of the beaches, we did ourselves using public transport, then a rental car on the last day. Definitely nicer to have the rental car since the buses don't run all that much. We drove to the end of the road on one side of the island and found a really awesome deserted beach.

From Ishigaki, we went to Taketomi one day and loved it! We rented bikes and just explored the whole island ourselves and it was a really fun, relaxing day! Absolutely spend some time on Taketomi. It's really beautiful!

For Ishigaki we again rented a car and visited around the whole island. I enjoyed getting A&W root beer and curly fries, and it was nice enough, but if we go again, I could probably skip Ishigaki for the most part and not be too sad about it. Iriomote was definitely more awesome, and doing Iriomote first meant that nothing on Ishigaki really topped that for me. Definitely more shopping and restaurant choices on Ishigaki though.

Thanks both for your suggestions. My thoughts are probably going something like this...

1) First 2 nights on Iriomote where I will hire a car. I'll also catch a ferry here earlier on the first day.

2) Another 2 nights on Ishigaki. One day will be a Takitomi trip, with the other day being a possible day trip around the island along with a trip to another island.

I'll probably use the info you provided Shinji....

Thanks for the suggestions. I'll probably do a bit of both of your suggestions. I'll the first 2 nights on Iriomote and hire a car. The second 2 nights will be on Ishigaki where I'll take some tours....

Since you're flying, if you haven't already gotten an Okinawa Island Pass, you should consider it.
http://www.churashima.net/jta/company/islandpass_en.html

Normally these short hop flights are quite expensive.

Hi Ken,

I was not aware of the Okinawa Pass, but used the ANA +JAL pass which allows for local flights in Japan for 10,000 yen a pop...