Day 8 - Wabbits and the Death Island

 Tuesday 28th October

We went on a bit of a trek today …. Ever since we decided to spend time in Chugoku  - I knew I wanted to go to Okunoshima.  Okunoshima is about 2 hours from Hiroshima and would require two trains and a ferry.

Okunoshima is also known as BUNNY ISLAND …. 

The island is covered in rabbits, they are everywhere.  No one can live on the island, there is only one hotel and one small tea room…. That’s it.  And as no other animals are allowed on the island, the bunny population keeps growing.

The most widely accepted story is that the local school children released 8 rabbits on the island to act as the island mascots …. And the rest they say - is history ….. bunnies doing what bunnies do …. So now there a hundreds of them all over the island.

At the ferry port, there is a gift shop (of course) where you can buy rabbit food.  You can also bring your own food … cabbage, carrots etc, but I didn’t have any of that, so rabbit food it is!

Bunny island from the ferry

We got to the island and immediately we see rabbits hopping around.  There are strict rules, one cannot chase, pick up or scare the rabbits and you can’t feed them by the road.  I removed the bag of bunny food from my bag and as soon as it rustled . . . Bunnies came a hopping!  They actually come right up to me and some of them jumped up at me. 

As I bent down to scatter the food, the rabbits would grab the bag… there are signs telling you to be careful as the little buggers will nip at you.  Still so cute tho…..

Sooooo cute

There’s a path going round the island and as I’m with Scott, we are going round that path.  All the way round there are rabbits under trees, under tables… everywhere!!!

Now - the island also has a horrible history.  During the war, the Japanese used this island to produce chemical weapons.  There was a secret Imperial Japanese Army facility on the island used to produce a significant amount of mustard gas and tear gas for use in WWII.

The island was chosen because of its location so it could be very secret and was the largest poison gas factory in Asia.  After the war, the island was removed from maps and all the workers sworn to secrecy.

There is a museum on the island showing what they did and the affects of the gas on the workers …. Needless to say, there were no photos allowed which is just as well, as I didn’t feel the need to take shots of that.

Back to the happy part…. The bunnies.  They are really not scared of the humans, especially humans with bags of food.

Bunny ears… you could listen through them and hea8 things behind you

Going round the island, there are old storage areas that were used for the gas, battle fronts that had cannons and guns to protect the island and at the end there is the remains of the power plant.  It’s in a shaded area and is realllly creepy.  This is the stuff of Stephen King novels.

I’ve now successfully made myself happy with bunnies and completely freaked myself out with the poison gas, so now time to get the ferry back to the mainland and start the long trek back.

We timed it really well and managed to go home during rush hour so every man woman and child were going home after a long day.  Bit of a squeeze on the train.

We didn’t get back home until late, so there was just time for food, a quick chill out, sort out tomorrows travels and then bed……

So for now …. Oyasumi Nasai ❤️