Kaichu Road

This guide to Kaichu Road on Okinawa starts with islanders wading through knee-deep mud at low tide to reach Henza island, and the amphibious trucks that offered a lucky few a ride after 1956. It follows the committee that formed in 1960 and spent years hand-laying rock and fill into open sea, watching a typhoon tear the work apart more than once. Stand here now on nearly five kilometers of packed fill, with two low bridges letting boats and tide pass beneath you, and consider the traffic this road was never built to carry.