Hiranoya Ryokan & Sauna
平野屋
Does Hiranoya Ryokan & Sauna allow tattoos? Yes!
Hiranoya, the oldest inn in Miya Onsen, opens its baths to tattooed guests from 9 to 11 p.m. each night and says so in a notice signed by its president. The window is short, and groups of three or more tattooed bathers are not admitted.
Tattooed guests may use the large baths here for two hours a night only, from 9 to 11 p.m., with nothing to cover. Outside those hours the baths stay closed to tattoos. The inn bars groups: three or more tattooed bathers in one party may not bathe together, and members of crime groups are refused. Anyone who troubles other guests or staff is asked to leave, tattooed or not.
The bath
Miya Onsen's water is Bihakusen, an alkaline simple spring found in 1998 at 1,200 meters under Harayama, 1.5 kilometers back from the shore. It comes up at 28.9°C. The inn calls it a beauty bath, unusual on a coast for carrying little salt or calcium, and lists it for neuralgia, muscle and joint pain, frozen shoulder, bruises and sprains. Slabs of mineral-rich granodiorite are set in the tubs.
Three bath halls share the first floor of the main building. Kirara-no-yu is the large bath, finished in granite. The cave bath is dim and rough-walled. Hina-no-yu is the garden open-air bath, a stone-edged pool under a timber roof. Kirara-no-yu and the open-air bath are on the same floor but you dress to walk between them. Every hall except the garden bath swaps between men and women the next morning. Hours are 5:30 a.m. to midnight.
Two public Finnish saunas, the Lounge Sauna and the Cave Sauna, use Metos IKI heaters and let you pour the water yourself. Two private sauna rooms, Shiro and Tya, are booked for 90 minutes with the temperature, light and music set to taste. The Ryokusuitei rooms on the 9th floor have a half-open-air bath of their own.
The hotel
Founded in 1932, Hiranoya calls itself the oldest inn in Miya Onsen and warns that some rooms and fittings show their age. It has 82 rooms in three wings: 36 in the main building, 25 in the east wing Ryokusuitei and 21 in the west wing Yurakutei, whose floors are themed on pottery, weaving and woodwork. The top-floor Ryokusuitei rooms with a half-open-air bath also get a glass-walled lookout room. The inn began as a restaurant inn, and dinner centers on Gamagori deep-sea fish. Two dog-friendly rooms have a rooftop dog run.
Good to know
- Tattoo hours are 9 to 11 p.m., and the baths themselves stay open until midnight.
- Two tattooed friends are fine; three are not. The inn refuses groups of three or more tattooed bathers.
- Free mineral water at the Karakuri Hiroba lounge beside the baths.
- Free pickup from Mikawa-Miya Station between 2:30 and 5:30 p.m.; phone the inn when you arrive.
Getting there
The inn counts about 45 minutes from Nagoya Station. Take the JR Tokaido Line to Mikawa-Miya, the station after Gamagori toward Toyohashi; local trains stop there and not every rapid does. The inn's free shuttle meets guests at Mikawa-Miya between 2:30 and 5:30 p.m. only: call the inn from the station when you arrive. The inn publishes no walking time. By car it is about 20 minutes from the Otowa-Gamagori interchange on the Tomei Expressway, and parking is free.
Mikawa-Miya STN · JR Tokaido Line
The inn publishes no walking time.
Free shuttle from the station between 2:30 and 5:30 p.m.; call on arrival.
Where it is
Hotel shuttle stop
- JR Tokaido line 50 min
- inn's pickup car about 1.5 km
- Shinkansen tickets Seats between any two stations, booked by date.
- JR Mt. Fuji-Shizuoka Area Tourist Pass Mini ¥6,500 · 3 consecutive days Worth it only if Shizuoka or Mount Fuji is on the same trip.
- Japan Rail Pass from ¥53,000 · 7, 14 or 21 days For a trip that takes in several regions by Shinkansen and JR lines.
What happens when you arrive
Check in and go to the bath. There's no seal to buy and nothing to mention at the front desk.
How we know
Confirmed from official site (the remarks on the inn's hot spring page, and a signed notice in Japanese and English linked from it)
ダイバーシティの価値観の高まりにより、PM9：00~PM11：00に限定して刺青の入ったお客様の入浴を解禁いたします。
The operator’s own wording. Show it if anyone asks.
Best for: a late-evening soak with tattoos uncovered at an old Miya Onsen inn, then a self-poured sauna
The rule sits with three prohibitions on the hot spring page: no members of organized crime groups, no group use by tattooed guests (three or more in one group may not bathe), and removal of anyone who bothers others. The inn's English notice, signed by its president, puts it as all guests including those with tattoos being able to use the public bath from 9:00 p.m. to 11:00 p.m. The baths are open 5:30 a.m. to midnight. Day visitors pay 3,000 yen on weekdays and 4,000 yen on weekends and holidays, towels included, 5:30 to 9:30 a.m. and 2 to 11 p.m. Private sauna rooms are 90 minutes, booked ahead. All rooms are non-smoking since June 2024.
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