Decided to spend 5 days in Ishigaki as part of Grobblers birthday but ended up only spending 3 nights as a Typhoon was scheduled to hit the southern islands of Japan for the last 2 days. This wasn’t a big deal as the hotel we stayed in was mediocre with a no-so great beach and worse than average swimming pool. You can read more about ANA Intercontinental Ishigaki Resort in this post. It was windy and on again off again rain and shine so not the greatest weather (we traveled in late September 2018), not sure if this was the norm of because of the ensuing Typhoon – probably a bit of both. The weather wasn’t too bad, didn’t stop us doing anything really and most of the time it was just a quickish, sometimes heavy shower.
Not a whole lot of things to do in Ishigaki, you can find out more about we did HERE. The town or city of Ishigaki is small and not much nightlife or things to do of note there. You go to Ishigaki for the beaches, or beachlife, and I say that because I didn’t think much of the actual beaches, even the best part, which is what you see in the photos online, was rocky and not that great for swimming, especially during our time. There was no snorkeling available because the wind was so strong making visibility low, so can’t comment on that. Diving was also probably limited. Even without the Typhoon, all the beaches had many rocks and shells on them and whilst the waters are that turquoise blue colour, I’ve seen better elsewhere.
Probably the worst thing about Ishigaki is the people, we found them to be the least friendly of any destination in Japan we’ve been to, including Tokyo, Osaka, Sapporo, Kyoto, Kobe, Fukuoka and pretty much every other place we’ve been to in Japan. On the whole, they all seemed rather unfriendly and serious and not the polite and hospitable service you usually get while in Japan.
Overall I don’t think I’d go back to Ishigaki. We had one nice dinner at a Japanese BBQ but other than that the food was pretty average, the city pretty ordinary and the people, as mentioned, rather unfriendly. It’s only a 1:45hr flight from Hong Kong, so I guess, if you told me you were going, I’d just say manage your expectations and you might be alright. Probably, as as normally the case, the weather played some part in my opinion, but still, I wouldn’t be in a hurry to recommend Ishigaki to anybody. I’ve got no idea how this was voted up and coming destination of the year and this is just more proof that most of those travel sites are complete scams, basically recommending wherever they get looked after the best.
More things to do in Ishigaki, visit this page, for things to do in Ishigaki with kids, go here, and for some inside tips before you go, visit this page. And as usual, feel free to send us an email or contact us on Twitter if you have any questions.
