Nakadomari Beach, Okinawa, Japan - Nakadomari - Things To Do Reviews

The crystal turquoise-blue waters off Okinawa, especially at sunset, should be viewed from this little traditional Okinawan village. But, you can also see the same stretch of beach from the Renaissance Okinawa Resort and Moon Beach Hotel. Nakadomari Beach is protected by an off-shore shelf about 2 miles out and is relatively shallow, allowing people to walk out to the drop off and harvest seaweed/shellfish during low tide.

Nakadomari Beach in on the East China Sea or West side of Okinawa, about half way along the west coast. It is also registered as a National Seashore. The beach has powered paragliders, horses, parasailing, fishing and scuba/snorkelling activities. The famous entrance to the bay is called Maeda Point, where there are stairs carved out of the rocks to allow you to step into the water for surfing, snorkelling and scuba diving. There are some underwater caves to explore in this area and the sealife is incredible, especially the colorful tropical fish you can let eat of of your hand!

In August 2004 we had 12 sea turtle (Japanese Kame) mothers give birth to about 1,000 baby sea turtles that made thier way out into the Pacific Ocaean. All the schools let out so the kids could watch this event of nature. The marine biologists and volunteers had moved the sea turtle nests inland and marked them so they would not be disturbed. Then they checked on all the nests and helped some of the baby sea turtles who got disoriented and tried to move inland vice out to sea.

Nakadomari also has local dragon boat races and the Renaissance Okinawa Resort even has an underwater restaurant and swimming with bottle-nosed dolphins on this beach. We loved the sunsets on Nakadomari Beach and we were thankful for the reef protection during the 12 typhoons we had that year. The beach is not a very sandy consistancy, more like small pieces of seashells so I can't give it a top recommendation rating. If you like to collect seashells though, you'll also like Nakadomari Beach.