Hi — I’m Tabiiku. I travel around Japan with my daughter on the principle that experience is the best thing you can give a child. This is HOSHINOYA Okinawa, on the main island. The headline: go in the off season, and go in October or early November.
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Getting there from the airport
About an hour by car from Naha airport. Rather than a conventional hire car I would use a car share service — Times Car Share is straightforward and good value.
What we did nearby
I researched a long list of things to see and then barely left the hotel, because the hotel was too good.
On day one we went to Murasaki Mura, an experience village about ten minutes away by car. You do a range of Okinawan crafts and activities inside buildings built in a traditional Okinawan style. It easily filled two or three hours.
The best things about it: unless you coincide with a school trip it is quiet, almost everything can be done without booking and without queuing, and it is cheap.
My daughter chose the go-kart circuit, bottling star sand, and making a power stone bracelet.
HOSHINOYA Okinawa: the room and the facilities
The room was superb. It is large to begin with, and modern while still feeling Japanese. The raised platform area became my daughter’s favourite spot in the whole hotel. The view of the beach from the room is deeply restful.
The pool is outdoors but heated year-round. It is big, easy to actually swim in, and the view is beautiful — my daughter loved it. Adults can sit with their feet in it and have a drink.
There is also a building called the Dojo, where you can have bukubuku-cha and chinsuko for free. Bukubuku-cha tastes something like sanpin tea, with a strange, wonderful foam sitting on top.
If I had to name the disappointments, they would be the bathing and the laundry. There is no communal bath, and given the setting it is a real shame there is no open-air bath either. And there are only three washing machines in the entire property, so unless you time it perfectly you will not get one. I would like to see one in each room.
Food
There are two restaurants. My daughter does not eat enough to manage a full course, so on the first night we went to Oaru Grill, where you can order a la carte. The meat is good, of course — but do try the shellfish dishes, which were excellent.
The Gathering Service is the other option. The food was good, but you finish a fair amount of it yourself at the table, which I would rather they simply did for us.
Breakfast can be taken in the room or in the dining room, and both were of a high standard.
One honest suggestion: there are a surprising number of restaurants within about ten minutes by car, and when I looked afterwards on Google Maps several of them were very highly rated. If you do not mind driving, I would actively consider eating outside the hotel.
Activities
It turns out you can dive and snorkel here all year round. But getting back to the car after coming out of the water is very cold, so I would recommend October to early November. Conversely, the July to September high season is apparently horrendously crowded, so if you want to dive somewhere popular, aim for the warm end of the off season.
We had booked three things in advance: a private Blue Cave tour early on day two, a snorkelling tour on the morning of day three, and horse riding.
Our luck was mixed. The Blue Cave tour on day two was moved to a different spot because of the wind direction, which was a blow — and then the day three snorkelling tour happened to go to the Blue Cave, so we got there after all. Given the Blue Cave tour costs around three times as much, I would not recommend booking the Blue Cave tour from HOSHINOYA’s activity list (I suspect the price difference comes from using a different operator).
What I would recommend is the snorkelling tour with Marine Service Murunushi. The guides have extraordinary stamina and it was enormous fun, and they take a great many photos for you.
The horse riding is also better than it sounds. Riding along the shoreline is the Okinawan speciality — normally these courses run through the hills. It is completely fine for beginners, so do try it.
That is HOSHINOYA Okinawa. The key is going in the off season but not the cold part of it — October to early November. And do consider eating at a local restaurant one evening.
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