Travel Walks: Ōkunoshima/"Rabbit Island" Japan

Walk around Ōkunoshima, better known as Rabbit Island, in Japan feeding rabbits and seeing the remnants of the old strait batteries used to deny access to the shipbuilding and industries along the Inland Sea of Japan coast in the early 1900s.

Before World War 2, the island was converted to a chemical weapons plant. As the war came to an end the Japanese - and subsequent American administration - tried to purge all history of it. Several decades would pass before the government acknowledged what happened there and granted medical benefits to the soldiers and civilians who worked at the plant.

These days, it's a tourist destination that offers a museum dedicated to that darker part of its history. But, it's also become more commonly known as home to a large colony of rabbits that eagerly jump out to be fed.

You can get to it by taking a Kure line train south from the Shinkansen stop in Mihama to Tadano-Umi station. An hourly ferry will take you from there to the island. Note that the rabbit food packets seen in the video must be bought at the ferry ticket office/gift shop and cannot be bought on the island itself. Bring the empty packets back! The shop will exchange them for an item.

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