It is Tokyo, but it takes twenty-four hours by ship: there is no airport.
The ship leaves Takeshiba at eleven and arrives at eleven the next day: twenty-four hours, and it is the only way to get there. It sails about once a week, so it is not the distance that decides how long you stay but the departure schedule. The islands have never been joined to the mainland, and life reached them on its own.
The Ogasawara Islands were uninhabited: the first arrival of which any record remains dates from 1670, a ship carrying mandarin oranges from Awa Province that had drifted off course. The first permanent settlement dates from 1830, and it was not Japanese: Europeans and Pacific Islanders. Japan was recognised as sovereign in 1876. In 1944 all 6,886 inhabitants were forcibly evacuated to the mainland, except 825 held back as military auxiliaries, and the islands only returned to Japan in June 1968. Today they are a UNESCO World Natural Heritage Site.
ℹ️ By sea only, on the Ogasawara-maru: departure from Takeshiba at 11:00, arrival the next day at 11:00; the return sailing leaves the island at 15:00 or 15:30. About one departure a week, so the length of the stay is set by the ship's timetable, not by the traveller. ⚠️ There is no airport.
🚉 Futami-kō (二見港) · 67 min walk
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