We started off our day by doing a short walk down to the dock area of Nagasaki. I'm not a big fan of boats - I get motion sick very easily - but generally, every time I do swallow back that sick feeling and brave one, it leads to good things.
Last night we booked a tour out to Gunkanjima (also known as Hashima...or that island from Skyfall) - something we knew we wanted to do, but waited to book until as close to the time as possible, so that we could look up weather predictions. Landing on the island is only possible about 100 days a year because of rough seas, so we were very lucky.
Gunkanjima - or battleship island (called so because of its shape) - is an abandoned island about 40 minutes from Nagasaki. Gunkanjima was established as an undersea coal mining island in 1887. Those who worked on the island lived on the island and it reached a peak population of about 5000 people in 1959, before it closed in 1974 when the coal depleted. After this, the island was abandoned for 30 years.
We did our tour through Gunkanjima Concierge, which cost 3900Y, as they had the only english website that we could find. The tour was done in Japanese, but staff could speak English and they gave English information in a binder to us.
I found the history of the island fascinating, and loved the abandoned island. We really wanted to explore more, but that was against the rules. And unfortunately they make you wear the list of rules around your neck at all times. Just so you don't forget.
After taking in a bit of abandoned Island we had a quieter afternoon, before going out to dinner.
For dessert, Hugh bought me the cutest birthday cake from a bakery near to our hotel. It was as delicious as it was cute.
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