Japan
Okunoshima
A former poison gas island now overrun by hundreds of fearless wild rabbits.
The rabbits arrive before you've left the pier. Hundreds of them — wild, unafraid, and deeply interested in whatever you're carrying. Okunoshima is a small island in Japan's Seto Inland Sea that manufactured poison gas for the Imperial Army from 1929 to 1945, a history scrubbed from maps and memories until the 1980s. Today the rabbits outnumber humans roughly 700 to zero permanent residents.
The Poison Gas Museum on Okunoshima documents the island's wartime role producing mustard gas, lewisite, and other chemical weapons — a chapter Japan officially suppressed for decades. The rabbits' origin is debated: some were likely released by schoolchildren in 1971, though the museum's former test subjects were reportedly euthanised after the war. The island is car-free, with cycling and walking paths looping the shoreline past ruined factories slowly being consumed by vegetation. The National Vacation Village resort is the only accommodation, with views across the Inland Sea.
Family
Children will talk about the rabbits for years. The island is flat, car-free, and small enough that even young legs can walk the whole loop.
Couple
The contrast between the island's dark history and its absurd present — ruins and rabbits — creates a mood unlike anywhere else in Japan.
- Over 700 wild rabbits swarm visitors the moment the ferry docks — children are instantly surrounded.
- The island's poison gas museum documents a dark wartime history erased from maps until 1988.
- Cycling paths loop the entire shore in under an hour, with rabbits lounging on the tarmac.
- A single resort hotel overlooks the Inland Sea — book a room facing the sunset side.
The island's single resort serves Seto Inland Sea fish and local citrus mikan.
Takoyaki and yakisoba from the harbour-side stalls before the ferry.
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