In the planning of Swim Shikoku – a stage swim around the Japanese island of Shikoku – I am swimming in various locations around the island to get a better feel for the conditions and situations in which I will encounter in 2026. This week’s Reconnaissance Tour #3 was primarily conducted in Tokushima which lies facing the Pacific Ocean and has taken a heavy brunt of seasonal typhoons for millennia.
Swim To Teba Island
Yesterday, I swam 3.7 km from Tokushima Kaiyō on Shikoku to Teba Island in 59 minutes 14 seconds. Along the way, my escort kayaker Masaaki Sugimoto of Outdoor Sports Square and I had to wait for a ferry boat to cross our path, but the water was very warm (25.8°C) and bumpy enough to be enjoyable.
From my perspective through my goggles, the inhabited part of the island looked like a fortress, surrounded by protective concrete sea walls to protect houses from the constant surge of waves from the Pacific Ocean.
We arrived on the island and I climbed up onshore. Sugimoto-san and I walked around the island and village within 12 minutes. Yes, it was outside the channel swimming rule of staying on dryland for a maximum of 10 minutes, but my primary goal was to take in the atmosphere and witness history in this old-time traditional Japanese village. What was surprisingly to me was that I was only attired in a swim cap, goggles on my head, and a swimsuit with flip flops on my feet – and yet no one seemed to bat an eye or do a double-take of a foreign swimmer in their midst.
Life on Teba Island
The island’s rapidly aging 84 residents live humbly in the spirit of historic Japan. With only 58 homes – many of which are abandoned, but liveable – the island has only seen one child born in the last 21 years by a recent arrival of a young family of artisans who moved to their parent’s house on the island from Osaka.
The village started in the year 1800 when five families started to make their homestead on Teba. The village slowly grew, but its population has been gradually decreasing over time. There are no cars or shops on the island where colorful fishing nets adone the few streets that surround the local harbor.
Net-laden fishing boats are clear evidence of the priority on the community – they live off what they catch from the surrounding ocean – and a healthy respect for the ocean and its marine inhabitants are overwhelmingly apparent.
The tightly bunched homes stand protected by large, protective concrete sea barriers where the relentless sound of the pounding waves tends to fade off even with a short walk around the streets.
Unhurried, unapologetic, and unworried, people just seemed to live in the moment as time seems to have slowed way, way down on Teba. Social media, vehicular traffic, sirens, convenience stores, and other signs of contemporary life seem to be unencumbered by the local residents and was as foreign as a swimsuit-baring American walking around with goggles on his head, fascinated by everything as I quickly dried off in the ambient air.
Apparently, not much has changed since the Meiji era (circa 1868) – for better or worse. The dryland tour of Teba will be forevered remembered.
Return Swim To Tokushima
After the quick dryland tour of Teba, I returned to the Pacific Ocean and swam 3.7 km back to the start in 1 hour 1 minute under slightly bumpy conditions in 25.8°C water. The mix of seaweed, schools of fish, underwater rock formations, and a constant sea breeze continued on the swim back.
Tokushima Coastline
I will be swimming in various other locations over the next few days in more explorations of what I may expect over a 3-month period starting in July 2026. With several dozens of these barely-inhabited islands – and many, many more uninhabited islands – surrounding Shikoku, I will undoubtedly be treated to additional surprises and wondrous experiences as my home base, a small, warm inn is run by a 72-year-old charismatic lifelong Japanese surfer, Aoyama-san, and his wife Mayu that cater to surfers and the pilgrims of the 1,200 km Shikoku Pilgrimage that is the inspiration behind Swim Shikoku course. I am staying in the Pipeline room.
Cape Muroto
Over the weekend, I will swim along various other points along the Tokushima coastline in more explorations of what I may expect over a 3-month period starting in July 2026
The circumnavigation swim around the island of Shikoku, one of the four main islands of Japan, will require traversing nearly 1,200 km around the inlets, islets, rocky coastline, fishing nets, oceans swells, and marine life along the rugged Pacific Ocean coastline and navigating the very fast tidal flows in the more sedate Seto Inland Sea that borders cities including Kobe, Osaka, and Hiroshima.
Today, I will head off to check out the wildly dynamic conditions around Cape Muroto. This sharp peninsula juts out boldly into the Pacific Ocean where waves and typhoons over the millenia have eroded its rocks and reefs into fascinatingly unusual shapes. With its tropically clear waters, the undersea views will be a living aquarium of fish, hammerhead sharks, sea turtles, and other marine creatures of all sizes.
The Possibilities
What is absolutely incredible to me is that no one here on Shikoku thinks the concept of Swim Shikoku is crazy or undoable. They are interested; they are curious; they are adventures in spirit and according to their practical lifestyles. In Tokyo and other big cities, almost everyone gets worried and focuses on problems and issues. Here on Shikoku, they focus on possibilities and potential.
This stark difference in mindset is refreshing and inspirational.
Shikoku, a remarkable part of the open water swimming world.
Photos courtesy of Masaaki Sugimoto of Outdoor Sports Square.
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