It would not be surprising to crumble the building structures at any time so that tour visitors can look around limited, but still, there are good highlights, so I’ll introduce them with pictures.
We boarded the Black Diamond cruise ship to tour Battleship Island, which Takashima Marine Traffic runs. When the sea gets stormy a little, this tour is canceled. The sea was getting rough and seemed canceled, but happily, we could land this time.
Marine Self-Defense Force Destroyer: Shimakaze. It is the second ship of the Hatakaze-class destroyer—4,650 tons of standard displacement, crew 260. It seems to have large-scale maintenance.
Destroyer Kongo also anchored. The first time held, the Aegis-equipped destroyer. Other than the United States. 7,250 tons of standard displacement, 300 crews.
Well, it is good. When it’s seen in the ocean, she is more beautiful.
It seems to have large-scale maintenance work.
Mitsubishi’s founder is a statue of Yataro Iwasaki. Before the Gunkanjima landing, I stopped at another island, where there was a museum.
Warship island is the site of the seabed coal mine. The mining continued from the Meiji era to 1974. This island has been attracting attention in the recent ruins boom. The Gunkanjima landing tour may be called a kind of ruins visit tour.
It resembles the battleship “Tosa,” with the nickname called Gunkanjima.
The middle is the elementary and junior high schools in Hashima.
I see the ship of another tour company.
Because it was enrolled in the world’s cultural heritage in the autumn of 2015, it may be crowded with tourists very much in the future.
I wonder if it is a more beautiful color of the sea if I come in the summer. It was cloudy with occasional rain on that day. The sea was dangerous but was a valuable amusement place for children at the time.
The shopping mall and condominiums on the back of this hill are also attractive, but probably it’s hazardous and badly dilapidated.
Gunkanjima, Battleship Island, Hashima
The Hashima elementary and junior high school.
Ruins tour is popular in Japan.
At that time, the island’s population density was the highest in the world—it islanders about 5,300 people in its heyday. Regarding population per square kilometer, 83,600 will be nine times Tokyo.
On the left is the third shaft winch building.
The maintenance factory.
The maintenance factory.
I think it is the worker’s residential 30th Building. This Building was built in reinforced concrete in the first period in Japan.
Workers residential.
Workers residential.
The embankment looks high, but it was hard on soggy in the direct hit of the typhoon.
Ruins of concrete.
Blacksmith’s workshop
The world of “Fist of the North Star” or the game “Fallout.”
Are workers residential?
Gunkanjima, Battleship Island, Hashima
Concrete is weathered.
The Building of red brick is the third shaft winch building. On the left is a general office.
The Building of the red brick.
Vertical pit pier. There was a lift where they climbed the stairs; The miner went down to the coal mine under several hundred meters. I remembered “Castle in the Sky.”
I see the tower like the lighthouse. It is unknown whether it’s working now.
I can see only a part of the island.
The tour course is almost 100 % safe as the road is paved. After all, so sorry that I can see only a part of the island. My wife is walking to the front. You had better prepare the cold protection in mid-winter.
I see the props of the belt conveyor form a line in front of the Hashima elementary and junior high school.
At that time, all the food and daily commodities were transported by ship. When bad weather continued, it would be severe. I’m thankful my location is now a supermarket at 30 seconds on foot.
There were around 30 tour participants on that day. Are there a few tour visitors generally in winter?
On the other side of the island, throw stones away from the entrance of the conveyor belt.
Hashima elementary and junior high schools. There seems to be a small ground on the back.
A guide explained that the executives lived on the top.
It is a water tank located on the top of the hill.
Old pier of concrete block Gunkanjima.
Because there are some tour companies, it seems to come alongside the pier by turn. I couldn’t land so lengthily, but I enjoyed it thoroughly and sufficiently.
I think this tour was approximately 3,500 yen in around three hours. Because the weather influences it, the tour practice rate is not unexpectedly high. A typhoon also comes periodically in summer; about half-days are canceled. It was good to look around the island safely.
(29-Jun-2016)
