Ine

About 230 houses stand along five kilometres of shoreline in Ine bay with their ground floors open to the water. These are funaya: the lower level was a garage for a fishing boat, hauled up out of the sea on wooden rails, with the family living above it. The road runs behind them, so from the land side they look like ordinary village houses and from a boat they look like a wall of buildings growing out of the sea.

The arrangement only works because of the bay. Ine faces north into the Sea of Japan, which is not a calm sea, but the bay is sheltered by a headland and by Aoshima island across its mouth, and the tidal range here is about fifty centimetres. Nowhere else on this coast could have built like this.

Most of the boats are too big for the garages now and moor outside, so the ground floors have become workshops, storage and a growing number of guest rooms. Some funaya take overnight guests, which is the best way to see the place: the tour boats stop in the late afternoon and the bay goes silent.

Otherwise, take the sightseeing boat or a sea taxi run by a local fisherman. Both go out onto the water, which is the only angle from which the village makes sense. Black-tailed gulls follow the boats for the snacks sold at the pier.

The village became a national preservation district in 2005. It is a working fishing community first, and the lanes between the houses are private space.

Getting here takes effort: about an hour by bus from Amanohashidate, and there is no railway.