Zamami Island of the Kerama Islands

Morning greetings from local sea turtles, and numerous secret beaches which will take your breath away. Zamami is a small and hilly island packed full of natural and easily-accessible beauty. Zamami’s most famous beach, Furuzamami Beach is popular for snorkeling with beautiful coral and many different kinds of tropical fish. Ama Beach boasts the highest chance to snorkel with sea turtles on the island (best in the morning).
Zamami has more than a few idyllic wild beaches which we highly encourage you to check out. Around Zamami, there are several idyllic deserted islands (we’d recommend Gahi Island) which are great for a half-day or day-trip by taxi boat (10 mins).
Zamami is the most popular of the Kerama Islands for international tourists, and has a well known campsite which hosts many of them!

The number of international tourists visiting the Kerama Islands has increased significantly in the last 10 years. Even still, it doesn’t feel busy even during peak seasons due to the limited number of accommodation and also the limited number of seats on jet ferries for day trippers.
However, water accidents have also increased in recent years with more tourists. Because of this, most tourist beaches with lifeguards on the Kerama Islands have started to ask people to wear a life jacket (or wetsuit) whilst snorkeling, especially in the “swimming surveillance area”. Alternatively you can just go to non-tourist beaches which have no lifeguards.
For experienced snorkelers who want to snorkel without restrictions, Aka Island (Aka-jima) is our choice among the Kerama Islands for easily accessible non-tourist beaches for a great snorkeling experience.

About the Kerama Island Group:
The Kerama Island group is known for some of the world’s clearest waters reaching 50-60m visibility. If you want to enjoy just beaches and snorkeling or scuba diving, rather than combined with jungle trekking or mangrove river kayaking, the Kerama Islands are highly recommended. The beaches on these islands are very beautiful but off-the-beach snorkeling is not the best since a lot of coral close to the beaches were damaged by El Niño in 2007 and 2016, although they have started to recover recently. If you can swim to the outer reef or go snorkeling or scuba diving from a boat, you can have a great experience (however, not as great as you would in the Yaeyama Islands and the Miyako Islands). The Kerama Islands are easily accessible by ferry from Okinawa Main Island (Tomarin Port) in 30 mins to 2 hours depending on your destination island and the type of ferry. If you want to have a car-free holiday, these islands are perfect as each of these islands is small enough to explore by bicycle/scooter.