{"id":3719,"date":"2019-08-20T10:03:09","date_gmt":"2019-08-20T01:03:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/hrcjapan.com\/water-sports-you-can-try-in-kobe\/"},"modified":"2025-08-28T11:34:45","modified_gmt":"2025-08-28T02:34:45","slug":"water-sports-you-can-try-in-kobe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hrcjapan.com\/en\/water-sports-you-can-try-in-kobe\/","title":{"rendered":"Water Sports You Can Try in Kobe"},"content":{"rendered":"

Whether you’re looking for an indoor swim or some outdoor action in a boat or on a surfboard, you can find plenty of water-based activities in and around Kobe at reasonable prices. Here’s a summary of what is on offer.<\/p>\n

Swimming and Diving<\/h2>\n

For those after proper swimming and diving facilities rather than just a splash around at the beach, Kobe has several sports facilities with swimming pools that are easily accessible. The Konami Sports Club has three sites in Kobe \u2013 James Yama<\/a> location, Sannomiya<\/a> location and Konan Yamate<\/a> location. Each venue offers 25-meter length pools with lanes and swimming classes where you can hone your technique. The Kobe Port Island Sports Center<\/a>, meanwhile, has a 50-meter competition pool and a plunge pool with five diving boards, the highest of which is 10 meters.<\/p>\n

Boat Sports<\/h2>\n

Fancy something a bit more involved than a simple swim? You can head out to the Aeon Mall Kobe Minami<\/a>, which is a large shopping complex that opened in October 2017. The place has a marine facility where you can partake in pedal boating, stand up paddling (SUP), canoeing, and (if you have a license) motor boating. Prices range from around 1,000 \u2013 5,000 yen for activities up to an hour. For a more structured experience, Paddle Your Trip<\/a> offers activities including kayaking, river SUP and white-water rafting at a range of nearby locations. Tailored plans for small groups are available. Instructors meet you at Sannomiya Station and transfer you to the activity location.<\/p>\n

Surfing<\/h2>\n

If you have your own surfing equipment, you can venture down to Suma Beach to try and catch a few waves or, for a more ideal experience, travel a bit further out to Isonaura Beach in Wakayama Prefecture. At Suma Beach, you can try a spot of windsurfing at Gem Resort (tel: 078-735-3120), which offers lessons for beginners from 5,000 yen. Inside the city, around 20 minutes drive from the center of Kobe, you’ll find an artificial surfing facility at Kobe Reyes<\/a>. Lessons are offered at 10,000 yen per person, with soft boards, wetsuits and marine shoes also available for rent.<\/p>\n

Water Polo<\/h2>\n

A slightly less well-practiced activity, water polo is a team sport where two teams of swimming players try to score goals against each other. The 50-meter pool at Kobe Port Island Sports Center<\/a> is available for water polo. There are no sessions in the sport currently offered but the pool is available for private hire, including the hire of equipment, if there is a group of you who want to give the sport a try. Contact the center to make inquiries.<\/p>\n

Water Sports Near to Kobe<\/h2>\n

There are numerous other water sports opportunities a short drive or train ride from Kobe. If you head along to Lake Biwa close to Kyoto, you’ll find the BSC Watersports Center<\/a>, which has over 40 years experience in teaching water sports including sailing, kayaking, and windsurfing. Also in Kyoto is the River Adventure Club<\/a>, which offers river rafting activities for 4,380 yen on the Hozu River.<\/p>\n

Imtiaz Joseph [CC BY-SA 4.0<\/a>], via Wikimedia Commons<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Whether you’re looking for an indoor swim or some outdoor action in a boat or on a surfboard, you can find plenty of water-based activities in and around Kobe at reasonable prices. Here’s a summary of what is on offer. Swimming and Diving For those after proper swimming and diving facilities rather than just a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":3720,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[165,63,150],"tags":[72,74,378,204],"class_list":["post-3719","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-kobe","category-outdoors","category-sports","tag-hyogo-prefecture","tag-kobe-city","tag-otsu-city","tag-shiga-prefecture"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hrcjapan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3719","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hrcjapan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hrcjapan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hrcjapan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/13"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hrcjapan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3719"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/hrcjapan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3719\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":50472,"href":"https:\/\/hrcjapan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3719\/revisions\/50472"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hrcjapan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3720"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hrcjapan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3719"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hrcjapan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3719"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hrcjapan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3719"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}