Odawara Diving School

Izu Peninsula, Japan

The team at Odawara Diving School are the kind of outfit we love for a quick escape from Tokyo. They’re PADI 5-Star, so all the usual courses are on offer, but we’d suggest going with them for their local expertise on the Izu Peninsula. Think of them as your friendly guides to a part of Japan that often gets overlooked by divers heading further south. What makes them a standout for us? It’s their knack for finding those quieter spots along the coast. We’ve had some truly fantastic dives here, drifting along walls draped in soft corals, watching the schools of chromis dart in and out. One particularly memorable afternoon, the visibility was a good 20 metres, and we spent a whole dive just following a pair of green sea turtles grazing near a patch of anemones. If you’re a macro lover, ask them about the nudibranch hotspots – they always know a few secret corners. Their setup is straightforward and efficient, which is exactly what you want when you’re driving down from the city for a day or two of diving. We’d recommend hitting them up for a mid-week trip if you can; you’ll often have the dive sites practically to yourselves.