Cruises to Shimabara
島原Nagasaki Prefecture, on the east of the Shimabara Peninsula, facing Ariake Bay
About ShimabaraNo upcoming voyage currently calls at Shimabara
NYK Cruises publish new voyages a few times a year. Tell us when you would like to sail and we will write to you when a call here is scheduled.
About Shimabara
A castle town at the foot of Unzen, running on the water the mountain sends down. Springs come up all over it. One street has a stone channel down the middle with carp in the water, and the houses along it draw on the same source. The keep, white and five storeys, stands above the lot of it with Ariake Bay behind.
Within reach of the port
Shimabara Castle
Finished in 1624 after seven years of building by Matsukura Shigemasa, on a scale beyond what his domain could carry, which is part of why the peninsula later rose against his son. The keep is white and five storeys, and it kept its four-hundredth year in 2024.
Shimabara City tourism (official) ↗in Japanese — your browser can translate it
The samurai street
West of where the outer wall stood, a street of houses built for the lower ranks, those on seventy koku and under. A stone channel runs four hundred metres down the centre of it, fed from springs two kilometres north, and three of the houses are open.
The samurai residences (Shimabara City) ↗in Japanese — your browser can translate it
The town where the koi swim
A hundred metres of spring-fed channel in the Shinmachi quarter, with coloured carp in it. Residents put the first fish in during the summer of 1978, as a way of teaching their children what the water under the town was worth.
The town where the koi swim (Shimabara City) ↗in Japanese — your browser can translate it
Shore excursions
NYK Cruises run their own guided excursions at each port, booked by guests themselves through My ASUKA PLANS — the booking window opens before departure and depends on your cabin class. They are conducted in Japanese. Going ashore independently is always an option.
Official sources
- Shimabara City (official) ↗in Japanese — your browser can translate it