MIKURA JIMA - a very special place

The true locals...


















Who could have known? I saw this island from a ferry passing by while on another job a couple of years ago and knew that I had to come back here to see more for myself. Mikurajima belongs to Tokyo city but couldn't be further away. This little rock in the middle of the ocean has on the western side a less steep wall of rock and is the only place you can access it. On all other sides there is a 400 meter vertical wall dropping straight down into the rough seas below. I had a certain mental image of what I would encounter but everything from the totally fearless dolphins to the thick rainforest like vegetation covering all made me realize this is an untouched jewel amongst the islands in the pacific just west of mainland Japan. Being a hard to reach protected national park with few locals up to this date has made flora and fauna flourish in a way we seldom see in this place of the world. It took me a days of waiting due to a passing by typhoon and half of the time I spent on the island was either in heavy fog, rain or storm winds...or all together. But I managed to shoot the native wild dolphins, climb over landslide damaged roads to reach the closed areas of this green and blue wind beaten oasis.
The small powerful Canon G9 in an underwater housing worked (use what you have, right) but recycling time was compared to the speed the dolphins swam by just too slow most of times. Totally fearless they torpedoed right by from all directions leaving me a feeling of just being a slow and clumsy human. For land photography I mounted 2 5D's with a 16-35mm and 24-70mm respectively and was shooting with this on all the time, wouldn't want to risk to get any of that salt filled air inside the housing. I have been abused my 2 5D's in the worst environments now for many years now and it always surprise me that they just keep on going. This story will be in one of Japans major airline magazines next year so please stay tuned.