Written by Matt Dursum
It’s just before sunrise, and Daichi Ikemizu pulls into a small beachside parking lot. More people pull in behind him. Car doors open, board bags unzip, and the sound of surfers frantically waxing their boards comes from every vehicle parked in a line along the beach. “Ohayou! Nami aru kana?” says Ikemizu to the groups of surfers gathering along the break wall. Then, an explosion detonates a hundred meters to the left and moves like dynamite towards them, ending in a powerful crash and surge of whitewater that almost reaches the parking lot’s steps. The first waves of the fresh typhoon swell arrive as planned and the surfers from Kagoshima Prefecture hit the water.
Photo by Yaron Ptashnik
As Japanese surf destinations go, Kagoshima is as remote and fickle as they come. Surfers sometimes wait for weeks for rideable waves to come, but when they do, they can be world class.
The Prefecture has three major surf regions. On its western coast is Eiguchi-hama, a series of beach breaks and a right point. Eiguchi-hama is the closest stretch of surfable coastline for surfers living in Kagoshima City. 20 miles offshore is Tanegashima, an island with consistent waves and a small but dedicated local cohort of surfers. Further south is Amami Ōshima, a spot that’s drawn comparisons to Hawaii and Indonesia for its heavy barreling reef breaks. And then there’s Ei.
Ei, is a small village, politically incorporated into the city of Minamikyushu. It has no highways, malls, or movie theaters. Its population, like many rural communities in Japan, is falling fast. So much so that having a graduating class in the single digits happens frequently at most elementary schools. For work, most people work in agriculture, particularly green tea—some of the finest in Japan—and sweet potatoes. Sweet potatoes are the base ingredient for the distilled spirit shochu, another regional specialty that gives the town the rich aroma of fermentation in the winter.
Photos by Yaron Ptashnik
Within this rural environment is a dramatic landscape. Kaimon Dake, a 924 m (3,031 ft) stratovolcano, rises over the sea. During WWII, teenage kamikaze pilots based in nearby Chiran would tip their wings to the mountain in respect, before flying off to fight their first and last battles. Along the black sand and reef shoreline are dozens of surf spots, some well known, and others closely guarded secrets.
“Ei is by no means a region blessed with constant waves,” says Daichi Ikemizu. Ikemizu is the creator of the annual Ibusuki Summer Breeze event, which teaches surfing to local youths during a weekend long event featuring live music and entertainment. He’s also a father of two and an avid surfer himself. Like other surfers in the area, Ikemizu heads to Ei when the conditions are right.
Photo by Yaron Ptashnik
Despite being inconsistent, Ei, also known as the Nansatsu region—short for southern Satsuma, which was what the region was proudly called during the Edo Period—is where good surfers go for good waves. “Among all the points in Kagoshima, Ei is special. Many surfers start in Eiguchi-hama and when they improve, they go to Ei,” says Ikemizu.
Ikemizu, along with several other locals, helps run the Nansatsu Surfing Federation, the area’s first organized surfing entity. Together, they organize beach cleanups and training events to promote surfing to a new generation. “Until we started the Nansatsu Surfing Federation, people’s awareness of surfing was really low and people were not cooperative,” says Ikemizu. On top of the regular beach cleanups, the organization installed toilets, maintained parking spaces, and encouraged community members skeptical of surfing’s potential to help out. “The mood finally changed to one of cooperation,” he says.
For many years, locals were unaware that their coastline hid, at times, world class waves. Typhoons frequently batter the island, and the sea was seen as an unpredictable force to respect at a distance. For many locals, especially the older generations, surfing still holds the reputation of being too dangerous.
Photos by Yaron Ptashnik
Surfing came to Japan around 1960 when American troops stationed near the coastal regions of Chiba and Shonan surfed on their days off. Locals quickly picked it up and in 1965, Japanese surfers founded the Japan Surfing Federation. The following year, the organization held the first Japanese surfing championship. Since then, the country hosted the first Olympic Surfing event, ISA Games, and plenty of Championship Tour and Qualifying Series events.
From the main island of Honshu, surfing spread to Kyushu Island and found itself rooted in Miyazaki Prefecture, Kagoshima’s wave-rich neighbor to the east. Miyazaki faces the Pacific and picks up more energy than the coastline of Kagoshima, which faces the East China Sea.
“Even from overseas, Miyazaki is getting recognized as a big wave spot, with people such as Ian Walsh, Makua Rothman, and Sebastian Steudtner, the Nazare champion, contacting us and visiting,” says Japanese big wave surfer Hironari Yamamoto. Yamamoto is one of the many Japanese chargers hailing from Miyazaki’s offshore slabs and tubing reefs such as Currens Point—named after world champion Tom Curren after he bravely tackled the point alone during a 20’ typhoon swell. “There are many young chargers from outside the prefecture, and there are also more Miyazaki Young Guns who are getting good shots in Hawaii and overseas, which makes me happy,” says Yamamoto.
Photo by Yaron Ptashnik
As surfers new and old carve Miyazaki Prefecture’s professional surfing legacy in stone, nearby Kagoshima is finding its beat. As the last bell goes off at Higashidaniyama Junior High School in Kagoshima City, Subaru Yoneyama jumps in the car with his father and makes the drive down to Ei to get a quick surf in before dark. Yoneyama is Kagoshima’s up-and-coming star. At 14, he came in second in 2023’s All Japan Surfing Championship, beating some of Japan’s top young talent. He also won the Patagonia Sendai Shinko Masters in 2023. He is sponsored by the surf shop Murasaki Sports and the Nansatsu Surfing Federation.
“My father picks me up from school every day and we go to the beach. When there are no waves in Kagoshima on Saturdays and Sundays, I go to Miyazaki,” says Yoneyama. Like most Japanese teenagers, Yoneyama enjoys spending time with his friends, but most of all, he loves surfing. “[Life’s] fun, but I want to practice surfing more and get on a lot of good waves.”
Yoneyama is one of the many young surfers growing up surfing the inconsistent waves of Ei. Like many others, he was inspired by the generations before him, such as his father and Ikemizu, who surfed Ei’s waves religiously with no prospect of sponsorship in sight. “The reason I started surfing was when my father was surfing and I was watching surf competitions, I realized I wanted to aim for the world through surfing,” he says.
Subaru Yoneyama surfing
Photos by Minoru Yoneyama
On any given day, with waves and favorable winds, locals rock up to a handful of spots in Ei. Oniguchi is the name of the main break. It has a small parking lot and concrete steps that go down to the shore. During the winter, surfers pack plastic tubs and gallons of scalding hot water in their cars with them. After their surf, they place the tubs in a row on the parking lot, fill them with the hot water, and enjoy an impromptu onsen (hot bath) session while watching surfers like Yoneyama rip in front of them.
Next, there’s Irino, a beach break that forms on the side of the towering Mt. Kaimon. And then, there are the seasonal spots that break during typhoons. “The best waves are at ‘Buta Out’ point. It feels like it’s not in Japan, with summer typhoon waves, glassy conditions, and an offshore tropical feel,” says Ikemizu. When a typhoon swell hits Ei’s beaches, the locals surf from dawn to dusk, stopping only for an afternoon bento box full of fried chicken, pickled vegetables, and rice from the restaurant Karaage Sonchou—also run by a local surfer.
A select few local chargers and visiting pro surfers know of a few secret reefs that offer waves of consequence and a break from the crowds. These shallow reefs have many faces, depending on the tides and swell direction. When everything comes together, the inside reefs and their outer reef counterparts offer powerful waves that have given surfers either the ride of a lifetime or unforgiving hold downs that pin them to urchins and coral. After the typhoons pass, usually within 48 hours, the sea returns to the stillness of a lake.
Photos by Yaron Ptashnik
At Ei’s Oniguchi beach, Yoneyama joins his father and brother, as well as Ikemizu and his family, and other local surfers for a beach cleanup. They fill their bags with empty plastic bottles, fishing line, plastic bags, and other broken down plastics that have washed ashore from one of the garbage patches in the South China Sea. The number of surfers and their supporters are increasing every year and the beach cleanup events continue to get more volunteers. Some are longtime surfers and many, to Ikemizu’s delight, are just getting into the sport.
Photo by Yaron Ptashnik
Through his popular Ibusuki Summer Breeze event, which attracts thousands of visitors every year, Ikemizu is on a mission to bring Kagoshima’s surfing talent to the forefront of global surfing. “I want people to know that great surfers like Subaru were born here. I also want locals to know that there are other options besides soccer, baseball, and volleyball,” he says. And for a community suffering from population decline, Ikemizu hopes that surfing “will also lead to the revitalization of Ei.”