Shirakunoyu 志楽の湯

As anoyone who knows me knows I love onsen! And in Japan the chance to soak in natural hot springs around the country is plentiful. Last night I made a new discovery almost right in my own backyard. Jason wanted to go to a bath so I suggested this place because I had heard that it was nice. Nice although is not a word that does this place justice. It is an oasis in the middle of a thriving metropolis. I actually felt like I had left the confines of this bustling city. Even if you can't read Japanese a look at their homepage will give you an idea of what I'm talking about. Below are a couple of pictures from that page. There are only 2 main baths but the size of the inside one alone is worth the trip. I would say you could probably get 50 to 100 people in it.

Then there is the outside bath.

Both of the baths are natural hot spring water and they were rather salty which was a bit of a surprise. And it was so calm and peaceful, I think Jason and I were the only ones talking. It just called for you to relax, be quiet, and enjoy the calm. I think it is goint to be a new retreat for me.

Nakagawa Onsen

So today even though it was hot, I decided to drive to Nakagawa Onsen and enjoy a nice soak. Actually it was too hot in the outside bath to stay too long and most of my time was spent in the indoor bath that also had a small outdoor tub. The best thing was I was there early enough so I could take some pictures.

This is the small outdoor tub. Wasn't as hot but still pretty much in the sun.

They also had a really nice garden with giant koi.

Tokusa Onsen

One of the places we visited on our trip was Tokusa Onsen. I didn't know it but Tokusa means bull rush in English. I won't post the pictures that Shige and I took they are bordeline NSFW. Just a lot of skin. This was the public open air bath along the river, it was a little hot and there were a lot of horseflies buzzing around. I have at least 6 bites. The other public bath called Hirose was not so hot and indoors the waters were very different and we should have gone back to Hirose instead of this one later on in the afternoon.

Hot spring

This was taken a couple of years ago on a trip to Shichimi onsen, this place wasn't open when I was there but it is obvious that they have a lot of thermal water. The place that we stayed at was very nice and I found out on my second visit with Susan that the Tanuki's come and visit the inn. In fact Susan said they came by the bath when she was getting out.