Kakazu Takadai Park

photo by Suikotei · CC BY-SA 4.0

photo by Suikotei · CC BY-SA 4.0

From the tower you look right into Futenma, and the reinforcing bars stick out of the pillbox.

You climb one hundred and twenty-four steps inside a tower shaped like a globe, and from up there you can see the whole of Futenma base, with Cape Zanpa to the north and the Kerama Islands to the west on clear days. But the park is a battlefield: the battle was in April 1945, and it lasted two weeks. A pillbox three to four metres on each side remains, its concrete seventy centimetres thick and its north side gouged by the impacts, so much that the reinforcing bars stick out. It is the only one left in Ginowan.

The Kakazu heights, which the Americans called Kakazu Ridge, were one of the most contested positions of the Battle of Okinawa: according to the municipality, the fighting began around 6 April 1945 and lasted a little over two weeks, and about 53 per cent of the district's inhabitants died there. What remains are the pillbox, the trenches dug along the slope (not open to visitors) and the war memorials, among them the Kyoto tower, erected on 29 April 1964 for 2,536 dead from that prefecture.

ℹ️ Free admission and free car park. ⚠️ The tower is reached by one hundred and twenty-four steps: the viewpoint is not wheelchair accessible, and there is no parking for coaches. By bus, Kakazu bus stop, fifteen minutes' walk. A visit takes half an hour or a little more. The cherry trees blossom between late January and early February.

🚉 Koei · 9 min walk

Sources: city.ginowan.lg.jp · 4travel.jp

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