When you think of the Izu Peninsula, you think blue sea, fresh seafood and relaxing ryokans. What you don’t necessarily expect is to be hounded by a hundred hungry monkeys with your flesh vulnerably exposed to scratching. And yet, these simian beasts clawed their way into my heart’s soft spot when I visited them last year.

Along the craggy cape live packs of monkeys waiting for inquisitive, if slightly wary, tourists to throw food at them. We decided to join a boat tour of the nearby rocks, where we were promised close encounters with monkeys. As waves crashed against the dubiously rocking motor boat, we clutched paper bags full of sweet potato, our eyes peeled for monkeys appearing from the dark crevices of the rocks.

This was just an entrée, however. Along the west coast of the peninsula is Hagachizaki Monkey Paradise, where no fewer than 300 monkeys roam free at the bottom of a steep gravelly hill. What alerted us to the potential dangers of the situation was the signs saying “keep hold of your loose belongings” and the old park keeper rescuing a man’s leg from an enthusiastic monkey’s grasp.

We tentatively crouched beside a couple of the smaller ones, and took pictures to prove we’d “done it”, while other excited tourists ran after the cute ones making baby-cooing noises. It seemed fit then, that the monkeys themselves simply looked on bemused, most probably wondering how they can ever be related to such a dumb species.