Kagoshima

Kagoshima has 87 onsen areas and 2,735 springs (Ministry of the Environment, FY2024). It ranks second in Japan for the number of springs and third for flow, with 1,695 springs at 42°C or hotter, and has 485 public bathhouses using spring water. From the sand baths of Ibusuki to the onsen districts at the foot of the Kirishima mountains and the springs of Sakurajima and Yakushima, its hot water is bound up with volcanoes and the sea.

Main onsen areas

Ibusuki lies at the southern tip of the Satsuma peninsula. Kirishima city gathers the Kirishima onsen district, Kirishima-jingu, Myoken and Anraku along the Amori River, and Hinatayama. Sakurajima has Furusato and Arimura, Akune is in the northwest, Nejime on the Osumi peninsula, and Yakushima has Onoaida and the seaside Hirauchi Kaichu.

Characteristic spring types

Chloride springs are the most common in our records, followed by sulfur and simple springs. Ibusuki is a chloride spring; the source at the Saraku sand-bath hall is 84.7°C, so steam drifts up from the beach as the tide goes out. The Kirishima district has nine springs large and small at 600 to 850 m, with milky sulfur water, sulfur-carbonated water and more. Myoken is a bicarbonate spring.

Reachable by public transport

Ibusuki is about an hour from JR Kagoshima-Chuo on the Ibusuki-Makurazaki Line. The Saraku sand-bath hall is 20 minutes' walk or about 5 minutes by bus from JR Ibusuki Station. For the Kirishima district, take a bus or taxi from JR Kirishima-Onsen Station to each spring, and Sakurajima's Furusato is about 20 minutes by bus from Sakurajima port.

For solo travellers

Ibusuki's Saraku is the town's largest drop-in sand-bath facility, an easy way to try a sand bath on your own. Hinatayama has public baths and private family baths as well as twenty-odd inns.

Food & culture

Ibusuki's sand baths already existed in the Edo period and are described in a gazetteer of 1843. You lie on the sand in a yukata while attendants called sunakake-san shovel warm sand over you from the neck down. The local dish, onsen-tamaran-don, is a rice bowl topped with an egg boiled in the sand-bath spring. The Myoken and Anraku area along the Amori River is said to be where Sakamoto Ryoma took what is called Japan's first honeymoon, and Hinatayama, said to be the oldest spa in the prefecture, was visited by Saigo Takamori. The area around Kirishima-jingu shrine was designated in 1934 as part of Japan's first national parks.