Onsen in Kyushu

An index of 115 hot springs across Kyushu, arranged by prefecture. Choose a name to open its page.

Fukuoka · 12

• Futsukaichi Onsen
• Hakata Onsen
• Harazuru Onsen
• Yoshii Onsen The Chikugo River moves with a particular unhurried weight through Ukiha, and on its left bank, Yoshii Onsen sits close
• Tokoro­da Onsen The water here was not sought.
• Hojo Onsen
• Hinou no Yu Onsen
• Matsubara Onsen The town of Tagawa carries its past quietly.
• Kakishita Onsen There is a small station on the Heisei Chikuhō Railway line called Kakishita Onsen-guchi — a name that still promises ar
• Kubote Onsen At the foot of Kubote-san, in the inland folds of Fukuoka's Buzen district, there is a single inn.
• Chikugogawa Onsen The Chikugo River moves with quiet authority through the lowlands of Fukuoka Prefecture, and somewhere in the middle of
• Wakita Onsen The waters here are simple — single spring, twenty-nine degrees at the source, the kind of lukewarm mineral bath that as

Saga · 10

• Furuyu Onsen The water here is almost indifferently warm.
• Karatsu Onsen Karatsu sits on the northwest coast of Saga Prefecture, a castle town that carries its history without making too much o
• Tara Onsen The Ariake Sea has a particular quality of light — flat, wide, almost hesitant — and the town of Tara sits at its edge a
• Ureshino Onsen There is a particular quality to water that softens skin so noticeably you find yourself running a hand along your own f
• Ogi Onsen The town of Ogi sits in a basin in Saga Prefecture, on the northwestern edge of Kyushu, where the Gion River moves quiet
• Irohajima Onsen The road from Karatsu thins as it approaches the border of Saga and Nagasaki prefectures, and somewhere along that thinn
• Kawakamikyō Onsen The water here does not originate on the premises.
• Takeo Onsen There is something almost municipal about arriving at Takeo Onsen — a town in Saga Prefecture that does not hide behind
• Torigoe Onsen Torigoe Onsen sits at the edge of Kawachi reservoir, in the forested hills outside Tosu in Saga Prefecture.
• Kumanokawa Onsen Along the Kase River in Saga Prefecture, a small cluster of inns and shared bathhouses has been drawing people to soak f

Nagasaki · 11

• Sechibaura Onsen At the foot of Kunimi-yama, in the inland folds of Nagasaki Prefecture, a spring rises at a temperature that barely exce
• Iki Yunomoto Onsen The island of Iki sits in the Korea Strait, neither close to the mainland nor far from it, and the onsen at Yunomoto occ
• Obama Onsen The first thing to know about Obama is not its name — which has, inevitably, drawn a certain passing amusement — but its
• Shimabara Onsen The water here does something unusual.
• Hirado Onsen Hirado sits on an island at the western edge of Nagasaki Prefecture, connected to the mainland by a bridge but retaining
• Hasami Onsen Nagasaki Prefecture holds more than its famous harbor.
• Kotonoyu There is something quietly dissonant about soaking in a sodium-chloride spring while a Dutch-themed skyline rises just b
• Inasayama Onsen Inasayama sits on the flank of a hill that rises just minutes from Nagasaki Station, yet the city below seems to belong
• Arakawa Onsen Fukue Island sits at the far western edge of the Japanese archipelago, and Arakawa Onsen sits at the far western edge of
• Nagasaki Onsen
• Unzen Onsen The ground here is not quiet.

Kumamoto · 24

• Mikawa Onsen The water here was not discovered so much as coaxed out of the earth.
• Hitoyoshi Onsen The Kuma River moves through Hitoyoshi with a kind of quiet authority, and the town arranges itself around that fact.
• Minamioguni Onsen
• Jigoku Onsen At seven hundred and fifty meters on the southwestern flank of Eboshi-dake, one of Aso's five peaks, volcanic gas still
• Jigokudani Onsen
• Tarutama Onsen
• Nuruyu Onsen
• Shugojin Onsen East of the Waiita hot spring district, along a stream that runs at the foot of Waita-san, there is a single inn.
• Oten Onsen There is something quietly disorienting about a place that once sat beside the sea but no longer does.
• Yamakawa Onsen At the southern edge of the Waita hot spring cluster, where the slopes of Yuigamine descend toward the Kitagawa river, a
• Yamaga Onsen
• Takenoyuu Onsen
• Hagenoyu Onsen
• Hirayama Onsen Tucked into the western hills of Yamaga, in Kumamoto Prefecture, Hirayama Onsen carries the particular quietness of a pl
• Yugahama Onsen The water here comes in two colors.
• Hinagu Onsen
• Tsuetate Onsen Nineteen inns line a narrow valley carved by the Tsuetate River, their walls so close to the water and to one another th
• Matsushima Onsen The springs here are relatively young.
• Ueki Onsen The Goshi River moves quietly through the basin, and along its banks the small cluster of inns that makes up Ueki Onsen
• Kawachi Onsen The waters here were found, so the story goes, during land reclamation work ordered by the Hosokawa clan somewhere in th
• Waita Onsen
• Aso Uchinomaki Onsen
• Aso Akamizu Onsen At the foot of Aso, where the caldera's breath still shapes the land, there is a place that makes almost no announcement
• Kurokawa Onsen Twenty-four inns line a narrow gorge in the hills north of Aso, and from a distance the settlement looks almost like a s

Oita · 28

• Shichirida Onsen What brings people to Shichirida is the water itself — not the idea of it, but the physical fact.
• Mifune Onsen Between Nagayu and Shichirita, on a mountain road that takes nearly an hour by bus from Bungo-Takeda station, there is a
• Kuju Kogen Onsen There is a particular quality to a place that exists as a single inn alongside a national highway, with mountains rising
• Kyusuikei Onsen
• Kokonoe Kyuto In the mountain interior of Oita Prefecture, nine distinct hot spring settlements occupy the same general terrain withou
• Kunisaki Rokugō Onsen
• Beppu Hatto
• Beppu Onsen (Beppu Hatto)
• Horita Onsen
• Tsukahara Onsen Halfway up the slopes of Garandake, at roughly eight hundred meters, the earth is restless.
• Kabeyu Onsen The story goes that a hunter first noticed deer descending to the Machida River to bathe — and so the waters at Kabeyu w
• Daishindo Chinetsu Onsen
• Amagase Onsen The Kusu River does most of the talking here.
• Hosenji Onsen At the foot of Waita-san, where the Machida River runs quietly through Kokonoe-machi, the village of Hosenji Onsen occup
• Kan no Jigoku
• Yamaga Onsen
• Kawasoko Onsen The river runs close here.
• Hyoshimizu Onsen Himeshima is a small island off the coast of Oita Prefecture, and most people who cross to it by ferry do not stay long.
• Hita Onsen
• Myoban Onsen
• Hossho Onsen
• Shibaseki Onsen
• Hokkein Onsen There are places you reach not by turning off a highway but by walking for two hours through mountain terrain, and Hokke
• Yutsubo Onsen Along the Yutsubo River, at the eastern foot of Waita-san, the land folds quietly into itself.
• Yunohira Onsen
• Yunotsuru Onsen
• Yufuin Onsen There is a particular kind of busyness that, rather than disturbing a place, confirms what drew people there to begin wi
• Nagayu Onsen What arrives first is the fizz — not on the tongue, though you can drink the water here too, but on the skin.

Miyazaki · 11

• Kushima Onsen The water comes from a thousand meters down.
• Kyomachi Onsen In the Kakutō Basin, encircled by the Kirishima mountain range, the town of Kyomachi sits quietly in Miyazaki Prefecture
• Kitago Onsen The train line that runs south from Miyazaki city follows the coast for a while, then turns inland, and somewhere along
• Nango Onsen The water here arrived without invitation.
• Yoshida Onsen The water at Yoshida Onsen contains radon, and there is something in that fact alone that asks the body to slow down.
• Amanoiwato Onsen Deep in the mountains of Kyushu, where the valleys narrow and the roads wind without apology, the town of Takachiho hold
• Miyazaki Resort Onsen Tamayura-no-Yu (Tamayura Onsen)
• Saigo Onsen The Mimikawa River moves quietly through the foothills of the Kyushu Mountains, and somewhere along its course, beside t
• Saito Onsen The water here comes from a thousand meters below ground, and it carries that depth quietly.
• Aoshima Onsen The waters here are abundant — that much the place has always known.
• Ebino Kogen Onsen At 1,200 meters, the air has a different quality — thinner, quieter, carrying none of the coastal humidity that defines

Kagoshima · 19

• Maruo Onsen The steam rises from the ground before you quite understand where it is coming from.
• Fushime Onsen (Yamakawa Onsen)
• Iriki Onsen
• Kuchinoerabu-jima The island sits twelve kilometers west of Yakushima, shaped like a gourd, built entirely of volcanoes.
• Furusato Onsen The waters here are chloride springs, saline and warm, rising at 48 degrees from the southern flank of Sakurajima.
• Fukiage Onsen The sulfur is the first thing you notice — not harsh, but present, a low note that settles into the air and stays there.
• Sakamoto Onsen Iōjima sits in the East China Sea, a volcanic island in Kagoshima Prefecture that most people will never think to reach.
• Shiobitashi Onsen The name itself tells you something: shiobitashi, salt-soaked.
• Myoken Onsen The Amagari River moves through Kirishima at its own unhurried pace, and Myoken Onsen has grown along its banks since 18
• Miyanojo Onsen The Sendai River moves quietly past the ryokan street at Miyanojo, and if you arrive without expectation, you begin to n
• Nemachi Onsen Kuchierabu-jima sits in the sea southwest of Kagoshima, a small volcanic island that most people have no particular reas
• Kodakara-jima There are fifty-three people on this island.
• Onoaida Onsen
• Ibusuki Onsen What arrives first is the sand — warm, heavy, almost alive against the skin.
• Shinkawa Keikoku Onsen
• Matsumoto Onsen
• Yunomoto Onsen The water is a simple thermal spring carrying traces of sulfur, drawn from four separate sources beneath the town.
• Yudamari Onsen
• Kirishima Jingu Onsen The waters here carry something unmistakably volcanic.