Taketomi village and Kondoi Beach

Taketomi is a small, flat island a short high-speed ferry ride from Ishigaki's port, and its village is protected as a preservation district for traditional buildings. Low houses with red-tiled roofs and shisa lions on top, walls of grey coral stone, hibiscus and bougainvillea over the gates, and lanes of raked white sand — it is the old Ryukyu that has mostly disappeared elsewhere, and it photographs in every direction.

The village is lived in. People's homes stand behind those walls, so sessions keep to the lanes, nobody climbs or sits on the walls, and gardens and gateways stay out of bounds. The water-buffalo carts that carry visitors through the lanes are part of the scene; let them pass rather than shooting around them.

On the west side, Kondoi Beach has shallow, pale turquoise water over white sand, and nearby Nishi Pier runs out into the sea — the island's place for the sunset. Mornings before the day-trip ferries fill up and the hour before sunset are the quietest; staying overnight on the island gives you the lanes almost to yourselves.