Hotel Nichinan Kitago Resort

The bath

The spring is a sodium bicarbonate chloride water that the hotel lists for neuralgia, muscle and joint pain, frozen shoulder, bruises, sprains and fatigue. The panoramic open-air bath on the hill gives a full circle of wooded ridges and sky; the indoor hall has a sauna. Both open from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m., and until 11 on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays. The women's side is cleaned on Tuesday mornings and the men's on Thursday mornings, reopening about 1 p.m., and women cannot use the open-air bath on Tuesdays from 6 to 8 a.m.

Four bedrock rooms sit beside the baths: Ganendo, a Himalayan salt room at about 45°C; Kimondo, a wood-grain room at about 45°C with quiet sound; Hanjungmak, a granite chamber at about 75°C; and Reikiyoku, a cooling room at about 23°C. Guests pay ¥700, children ¥350.

Day use runs from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m., last entry 9 p.m.: bath only ¥800 on weekdays, ¥1,000 on weekends and holidays and ¥1,300 at New Year and Golden Week, or ¥1,400, ¥1,700 and ¥2,400 with the bedrock rooms. The family bath is the private option, one room, reservation only, from 3 to 10 p.m. and sold by the hour: ¥2,700 for day visitors, and a paid hour for staying guests at a price the page does not print. The photo shows a stone tub with a rock wall and a window onto a courtyard tree. Ask the hotel ahead to hold a slot.