Iriomote Island Crossing (Okinawa)
- Tee
- Apr 21, 2023
- 3 min read
Updated: Sep 23
The Iriomote Island Crossing is a challenging yet stunning hike that takes you through dense rainforest and along clear rivers in one of Japan’s most remote islands. Careful planning is important, as access to the trailheads and transportation back is complicated. Despite the logistical challenges, the hike across the island is incredible adventure walking through wild, untouched nature.
⏲︎ Time: 10h
✎ Kanji: 西表島のジャングルを横断
⚲ Location: Iriomote Okinawa
↔ Distance: 26.5km
✮ Difficulty: Difficult
ᨒ Elevation Gain: 807m
☀ Dayhike
☉ Hiking Season: year-round
Access
Start at the boat tour dock (下流船着場) for the urauchi river. Take the first boat, which should be at 9:00 am, but check their website beforehand for departure times. They have toilets, snacks, and showers there. Make sure to come early, because they made us fill out some form again (that we had already filled out at the police/forestry department). Then get a one-way ticket for the boat. It was around 2000¥.
Since public transportation is limited on the island we recomend to either rent a car and park it at the end of the trailhead (close to Otomi village) or stay somewhere close to it and have your guesthouse drive you to the boat dock. If you take the first bus up to the boat, you will not have enough time for the hike!
We parked our rental car at the end the day before, then took a bus back up north (60min) and stayed close to the boat dock and walked to it in the morning.
The road up to the trailhead was locked and we parked next to the road close to the cemetary. If you get a guide they can drive up a little closer.
Taxis are another option, but the drive is an hour long and costly. It will also need to be reserveved in advance.
Trail description
When you get off the boat the first part of the hike is well maintained and a nice little rock path. Until Maryude and Kanpire waterfall it's easy and anybody can walk this secion. It took us about 30min to get there.
After that is where the real fun begins. You'll walk up in the riverbed, either directly in the water or in mud. Sometimes the trail is easy to spot and other times you will have no idea if you're still on trail. Keep a constant lookout for the little pink ribbons and if you don't see any for a while go back.
Sometimes the trail will follow a small riverbed in the jungle, other times it will go into the rainforest. These parts were especially tricky to spot and my friend walked off trail a couple of times.
There are a couple of narrow sections and one or two ropes but nothing technical. The main challenge of this hike is not to get lost or take too long.
The last hour or so will be on a gravel road back to the car and downhill.
Land leeches
Iriomote has a lot of land leeches, to avoid them ski socks over pants worked well and none got through. My friend was wearing thinner socks and they were able to bite through. As you can see one of us wasn't wearing any socks and he peed on his legs/feet throughout the day, he didn't have any either. Pick whichever one you're most compfortable with ;) but there are a lot of leeches. I picked maybe 30-40 off of my socks.
Also if they do get through, salt works. They come right off.
Extra Info:
The hike is not well-marked, has no cell service, and lots of leeches.
Iriomote is a national park, wild camping is not allowed.
Dont walk this hike alone or during bad weather because of flash floods.
You need to register the hike with the local police and forestry office.
Have a look at the distance and sunlight hours. We got out of the jungle just before sunset. Iriomote has venomous snakes (habu) which usually come out after sunset.
