Empty golf links highlight charm and despair of remote rural Japan

Missing putts, missing people and splendid scenery are par for the course

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The final hole on Ojikajima Island's rare, five-hole course (Photo by Andrew Thomson)

ANDREW THOMSON, Contributing writer

Playing golf in Japan is expensive unless you venture to the farthest reaches of the country. It is here you will find a few extraordinary golf courses that are very cheap to play and barely known, even to the Japanese. You will also see at first hand the acute problems plaguing Japan these days -- a rapidly aging population and the consequent shortage of labor that makes it difficult to support existing industries and nearly impossible to create new businesses.

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