Higashikata, in the pine woods above the Chirin-ga-shima sandbar National park lodge with its own sand bath

Kyukamura Ibusuki

休暇村指宿

Does Kyukamura Ibusuki allow tattoos? In a private bath

Private bath only

A national park lodge in the pines above the sandbar, where the sand is laid indoors with loquat leaves stirred through it, and the half-open-air bath Yuyu is booked ahead by the party rather than claimed at the desk on arrival.

No tattoo rule appears anywhere on the lodge’s pages, including a FAQ that runs to nearly thirty questions. The bath it does document is Yuyu, a half-open-air bath reserved in advance and used by one party for forty-five minutes, and the operator states that day visitors may book it too. The shared baths, the foot bath and the sand bath carry nothing either way.

Where it is

Hakata to Ibusuki is about 3 h 25: the Kyushu Shinkansen to Kagoshima-Chuo, then the Ibusuki Makurazaki line down the coast, which the sightseeing train Ibusuki no Tamatebako also runs. Ureshino is about 1 h 20, a limited express to Takeo-Onsen and the Nishi-Kyushu Shinkansen one stop further. Kurokawa has no railway at all: the coach from Hakata takes about 2 h 40 by way of Hita and Tsuetate. Kyukamura Ibusuki · map data © OpenStreetMap contributors · open in Google Maps

What happens when you arrive

Skip the shared baths and reserve the private one the way this page describes. Once the door is closed, the bath is yours.

How we know

Confirmed from official site, bath structure rather than a tattoo policy (the operator’s own hot spring page, read from an Internet Archive copy dated 19 February 2026; the live site refused our requests on 15 September 2026)

Read on: qkamura.or.jp/ibusuki/hotspring/

Best for: Holding a private bath by reservation, days before you arrive

Yuyu was refurbished in September 2023 and costs 2,500 yen for 45 minutes, 7:00 to 20:00, reserved in advance, and open to day visitors as well as guests. The sand bath, Yusa, is indoors and runs in any weather: 1,400 yen for guests, 1,800 yen for day visitors, 11:00 to 21:00 and 11:00 to 20:00 respectively, holding 24 people, with men and women shown to the same sand floor. The lodge adds loquat leaves to the sand for 100 yen more, which it says is its own idea. Second and fourth Tuesdays open at 12:00 for cleaning.

Check availability

Booking through this button costs you nothing extra and sends a small commission our way — it’s what keeps this guide free for our tattoo community, and every policy on it checked. Thank you.

Others in the same group

More places in the Ibusuki Onsen with private bath only

Ibusuki HakusuikanHigashikata, on its own stretch of beach north of the town → Ibusuki Seaside HotelJucho, at the northern end of the seafront → Ryokan KawakyuOmure, by the river a few streets back from the seafront → Hotel ShougetuYunohama, a short walk down the front from the sand bath hall → Koran no Yu KinkouroNishikata, on the coast road four kilometers north of the town → GinsyoYunohama, on the seafront two doors from the sand bath hall →

All Ibusuki Onsen listings →