The entrance and rooftop viewing deck of Yambaru Pineapple Hills Aha

Stations #14

Aha,
the pineapple hill

Okinawa's newest roadside station, built with a university on the coast nobody drives — where the fruit that can't be sold becomes cake, and then becomes pork.

Kunigami, east coastOpened 202210:00–17:00Fact-checked Aug 2026

Pineapple smoothie ¥650100% Yanbaru fruit · nothing added

The loop

In short

three things to know before you take the east road

Newest station on the island

Registered in 2021, opened March 2022 — and run under a partnership between Kunigami Village and Keio University's graduate school of media design. It's a working experiment as much as a shop.

Nothing gets thrown away

Pineapples that fail grading become cake and confiture; what's left feeds pigs, which come back as paiton pork on the menu. The loop closes on one site.

The view costs ¥340

The rooftop swing, the forest trail and the observation building are a paid zone: ¥340 for adults, ¥170 for primary-school children. The main building's viewing deck is free.

The east coast of northern Okinawa is the part that gets driven past. This station was built to change that — and it does it in the least likely way: by treating substandard pineapples as a design problem.

The idea

Fruit, cake,
pig, plate

Okinawan pineapple that fails grading — bruised by a typhoon, wrong shape, wrong size — used to be a loss. Here it becomes something else, twice.

Step one

Cake, ¥330A Taiwanese-style pineapple cake made with the local N67-10 variety. Limited numbers; when the shop sells out, the café gets the rest.

Step two

Paiton porkWhat can't be baked feeds pigs. That pork returns as the miso-and-pork rice plate at ¥1,480 — food waste, twice converted.

And the smoothie

¥650100% Yanbaru pineapple, no flavourings, no additives. The single most ordered thing on the site.

The station calls itself a michi-no-eki with a different set of characters — a pun on "seeing", "fruiting", "future", "land" and "knowing". Behind the wordplay is a genuine research partnership with Keio University, aimed at whether a depopulating village can build income and jobs from what it already grows. You are, quite literally, eating the results.

The café

Order at
the screen

Ordering is by large touchscreen, which is genuinely useful if you don't read Japanese — the menu carries English throughout. Last orders are at 16:30, half an hour before the site closes, which catches people out.

The signature dish is Yambaru mazemen — a mixed, brothless take on Okinawa soba at ¥990, sold as something you can't eat anywhere else. There's also a straightforward stewed-pork soba at the same price, a slow-cooked pork curry at ¥1,100, and a thick omelette-and-pork burger at ¥980.

The shop floor at Yambaru Pineapple Hills, with local products and a large touchscreen ordering console behind — The shop, with the café's ordering screens behind.

Banana bread, ¥1,180

Yanbaru banana bread with Ryukyu cinnamon cream and local pineapple confiture. More dessert than snack.

Aka-ushi beef

Wagyu from Aso in Kyushu, raised on grassland the ranchers manage for water retention and lower methane. Steak sets have run at ¥2,980 as a trial price.

Fresh pineapple

Sold roughly July to October, depending on the harvest. Outside that window, it's the processed goods and the cookies.

¥340

The swing, and the forest trail

Buy a yellow wristband at the shop till and you can use the rooftop swing over the pineapple fields and the Pacific, the forest walking trail, and the observation building. ¥340 for adults, ¥170 for primary-school children, free under school age. The money maintains the trail and the nest boxes.

Fair warning: the swing is up 64 steps. The main building's sea-and-hill viewing deck is free if you'd rather not.

More than a shop

Free Wi-Fi 6 across the site, free EV charging, showers (¥600 for 20 minutes), a coin laundry open around the clock, and a co-working space in the trees — a day pass is ¥1,100, five hours ¥550.

The valley here is Okinawa rail habitat, and the station streams a 24-hour wildlife feed. There's no light pollution either: the lawn is dark enough to see the Milky Way, and on New Year's Day the site opens at 6:00 with the swing free for sunrise.

Getting there —
bring the car

By car

About 2 to 2½ hours from Naha Airport. Expressway to Kyoda IC, Route 58 north, then right at Yona onto Prefectural Route 2 to cross the island, and south on Route 70 down the east coast.

Roughly 30 minutes from Yui-Yui Kunigami, 40 from Cape Hedo, an hour from Nago. Free parking, 45 spaces, with toilets open 24 hours.

By bus — not viable

The nearest stop, Aha Kyōdō-ten on the village bus, is a 40-minute walk from the station.

Treat a rental car as essential. One more thing to know: Route 70 is closed for the Tour de Okinawa cycle race each November, which can trap cars on site.

1089-7 Aha, Kunigami
Okinawa 905-1504

10:00–17:00 (café last orders 16:30) · 45 free spaces · 24-hour toilets · free EV charging

Open in Google Maps →

Need a taxi? Here's how it works in Okinawa

This is the emptiest road in the series. A taxi here has to come from a long way off, so plan rather than improvise — but if you need one:

Use an app. GO — Japan's main taxi app — works in Okinawa with an English interface. DiDi and Uber cover parts of the island. Install before your trip.

Dial with +81. From a foreign phone, replace the leading 0: 0980-XX-XXXX → +81 980-XX-XXXX. Wi-Fi calling works too.

Ask the staff — show them this:

タクシーを呼んでください

Takushī o yonde kudasai

Nearest stations from here

Aha is the far corner: the east side of the north, on a road most visitors never take. Everything else is at least half an hour away, and that is exactly the point.

See the whole series →

9.6 km · ~15 minMichi-no-Eki Yui-Yui Kunigami, Kunigami — The island's northernmost station, at the edge of the Yanbaru forest.

17 km · ~30 minMichi-no-Eki Ogimi, Ogimi — A forest visitor center in the village of longevity.

25 km · ~40 minMichi-no-Eki Sunrise Higashi, Higashi — Sunrise, pineapples and mangrove country on the east coast.

30 km · ~50 minKouri Sorahashi, Kouri — Where the sky bridge lands, with showers for after the beach.

Practical information

Address1089-7 Aha, Kunigami Village, Kunigami District, Okinawa 905-1504

Phone0980-43-5115 (from abroad: +81 980-43-5115)

Hours10:00–17:00. Café last orders 16:30; shower reception closes 16:30.

ClosedSecond Wednesday of the month from November to March. Open daily April to October. Closes for typhoons and twice a year for stocktaking.

Paid zoneSwing, forest trail and observation building: ¥340 adults, ¥170 primary school, free under school age. The main viewing deck is free.

ParkingFree, 45 spaces. Toilets and parking open 24 hours; accessible toilet with ostomate facilities, plus 24-hour nursing and baby-change.

FacilitiesFree Wi-Fi 6, free EV charging (2 points, app required), coin laundry (¥500/130 min), showers (¥600/20 min), co-working from ¥550

RulesNo pets except assistance dogs; the entire site is non-smoking outside the smoking room

NoteThe on-site campsite has been closed for refurbishment since November 2025 — don't plan to stay overnight

Officialpineapple-hills.jp

Questions, answered

Is the swing free?+

No. The rooftop swing, forest trail and observation building are a paid zone — ¥340 for adults and ¥170 for primary-school children, bought as a wristband at the shop till. The main building's viewing deck is free, and so is parking.

When is it closed?+

On the second Wednesday of the month from November to March. From April to October it opens daily. It also closes for typhoons — which happens several times a summer here.

What's paiton pork?+

Pork from pigs fed on pineapples that failed grading. The station bakes what it can into cake and feeds the rest to the pigs, then serves the pork as a rice plate. It's the clearest example of the food-waste loop this station was built to test.

Can I camp or stay overnight?+

Not at present. The on-site camp village has been closed for refurbishment since November 2025, with no reopening announced. The station itself is open as normal.

Sources

Yambaru Pineapple Hills official site and its June 2026 site map for hours, prices, the paid zone and facilities, checked August 2026 · Okinawa General Bureau for parking · Keio University press release on the research partnership · 道の駅やんばるパイナップルの丘（おきなわLovers 日本語版）. We added the entry fee and the winter closing day, which our Japanese article omits, and removed the suggestion that you can stay overnight.

Every station

nearest first, from where you are now

Michi-no-Eki Yui-Yui KunigamiKunigami · 9.6 km Michi-no-Eki OgimiOgimi · 17 km Michi-no-Eki Sunrise HigashiHigashi · 25 km Kouri SorahashiKouri · 30 km Rikarika WarumiNakijin · 33 km Nakijin no Eki So-reNakijin · 36 km Wansaka Oura ParkNago · 37 km Haneji-no-EkiNago · 38 km Michi-no-Eki GinozaGinoza · 45 km Michi-no-Eki KyodaNago · 48 km Umi-no-Eki AyahashikanUruma · 69 km Onna-no-Eki NakayukuiOnna · 73 km Uru MarcheUruma · 73 km Michi-no-Eki Kina BanjoYomitan · 83 km Michi-no-Eki KadenaKadena · 84 km Happy More IchibaGinowan · 92 km Michi-no-Eki ToyosakiTomigusuku · 115 km Minami-no-Eki YaeseYaese · 115 km Michi-no-Eki ItomanItoman · 118 km

Aha,the pineapple hill