My favorite TATAMI ROCKS were formed during the Miocene period by the columnar jointing of andesitic lava as it cooled and contracted. The name is derived from the resemblance to a room of close-fitted tatami mats, while the feature is sometimes also likened to a turtle’s carapace. Located in Japan, Okinawa, on the south coast of the island of Ōjima (奥武島), to the immediate southeast of Kume Island, it lies within Kumejima Prefectural Natural Park. Exposed at low tide, the feature comprises some one thousand pentagonal and hexagonal rocks, each 1 to 1.5 metres in diameter, stretching fifty metres from north to south over a length of two hundred and fifty metres. They were formed in the same way like the Giant’s Causeway in UK! You can walk to them in 3 minutes from the AMIMOTO RYOKAN Hotel where I’m staying on Ojima and see them in many aspects from sunrise till dawn!!
