Yamashiro Onsen Koso-yu

photo by Maarten Heerlien from Voorschoten, The Netherlands · CC BY 2.0

photo by 掬茶 · CC BY-SA 4.0

A bath rebuilt as it was in the Meiji era, with walls and floor in Kutani tiles.

The bath reproduces not only the outside but also the inside of its original model: the floor and walls have the same hand-painted Kutani ceramic tiles, and you wash sitting on low stools facing the wall, as people did then. It is a working public bath, not only an onsen museum: you go in to wash, not just to look.

Yamashiro Onsen is one of the three historic hot-spring towns of the Kaga Onsen area; the Koso-yu was rebuilt on the model of the town's main public bath, reproducing the form it had in the Meiji era (late nineteenth century), before the twentieth-century renovations.

ℹ️ Open 6:00–22:00, closed on the morning of the fourth Wednesday of the month. Ticket: adults (12 and over) 700 yen, ages 6–12 200 yen, ages 3–6 100 yen. Next door, the modern totoyu (総湯) stays open with separate hours and tickets for anyone looking for a simpler bath. In Yamashiro Onsen, reachable by bus from Kaga-Onsen Station.

🚉 Kutaniyaki Kiln Ruins Exhibition Hall · 11 min walk

Sources: yamashiro-spa.or.jp · hot-ishikawa.jp

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