Unzen Iwaki Ryokan
雲仙いわき旅館
Does Unzen Iwaki Ryokan allow tattoos? In a private bath
Iwaki draws its water from a spring on its own land and runs it into five special rooms with an open-air tub each. There is no private bath to rent, so a room with its own tub is the one to book.
Iwaki publishes no tattoo rule and has no private bath to rent. The answer is one of its five special rooms, each with its own open-air tub fed straight from the spring that rises on the inn's own grounds. The ordinary rooms share the indoor and open-air baths.
The bath
Iwaki's water is an acid sulfur spring with aluminum sulfate, pH 2.2 by the inn's FAQ, and the inn says it is the only one in Unzen with a plentiful source on its own grounds, so every bath runs 100 percent natural spring water, free-flowing and always fresh. The white flakes in it are sulfur crystals, which the inn calls proof of real spring water. For bathing it lists neuralgia, muscle and joint pain, frozen shoulder, bruises and sprains, digestion, piles, cold sensitivity, recovery after illness and fatigue; for drinking, gallstones, constipation, obesity, diabetes and gout. Silver jewelry will tarnish, so take it off. There is an indoor bath and an open-air bath whose temperature, the FAQ says, is left to the weather and the season rather than adjusted. The inn does not publish bathing hours or bath names.
The five special rooms are the reason to come. Each has its own open-air bath on the room's veranda, fed from the source and free-flowing. The inn's photo shows a rectangular stone tub of milky water under a wooden roof, closed in by bamboo fencing with young maples and a stone lantern on the far side, and a washing place with a stone basin beside it. The FAQ offers these rooms to families with small children, booked by phone. There is no reservable private bath for other rooms.
The hotel
An old inn, built in the traditional way with wide tatami rooms of the old hon-ma size; the upper floors look straight over the Unzen Jigoku. Dinner is kaiseki (a multi-course Japanese meal) with a Nagasaki beef hot-plate course, and a choice menu adds Ise lobster. Hot-water bidet toilets are in every room. The inn uses a free contracted car park nearby and says any space in it will do. The site is in Japanese, English, Korean and Chinese.
Good to know
- Five rooms have their own open-air tub, and they are the only way to bathe alone here.
- The open-air bath is as hot as the weather makes it; the inn does not adjust it.
- A minute's walk from the Shimatetsu bus office, where the Isahaya and Nagasaki buses stop.
- Free parking in a contracted lot nearby, first come, first served.
Getting there
From Isahaya Station take the Shimatetsu bus bound for Unzen, about 80 minutes by the inn's count, and get off at the Shimatetsu Unzen bus office; the inn is a one-minute walk. From Nagasaki Station the Kenei bus for Unzen stops at the same office after about 100 minutes. From Hakata, the Relay Kamome and the Nishi-Kyushu Shinkansen reach Isahaya in about 80 minutes. By car it is about 60 minutes from the Isahaya interchange on Route 57.
Isahaya STN · JR Nagasaki Main Line and Nishi-Kyushu Shinkansen (Kamome), then the Shimatetsu bus
Not walkable.
Shimatetsu bus about 80 minutes to the Unzen bus office, then one minute on foot.
Where it is
Unzen bus stop
- JR limited express 57 min
- Nishi-Kyushu Shinkansen 20 min
- Shimatetsu bus 1 hr 26 min
- Shinkansen tickets Seats between any two stations, booked by date.
- JR Kyushu Rail Pass from ¥12,000 · 3, 5 or 7 consecutive days Worth it if you’re coming from Hakata by train.
- Kyushu SunQ Pass Worth it if you’d rather ride buses. It covers the Shimatetsu buses from Isahaya and the direct bus from Nagasaki Station to Unzen, and highway buses across the island.
- 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
Use the bath in your room, or reserve a private bath by phone.
How we know
Bath layout confirmed, tattoo policy not published Checked on the official site (the rooms page counts five special rooms with a source-fed open-air bath; the FAQ names them as the option for families with small children)
Best for: a tattooed couple who want an old-style room with the inn's own spring running into a tub on the veranda
Five special rooms with an open-air bath of source water, free-flowing. The inn says it is the only Unzen inn with an abundant source on its own site, so every bath is 100 percent natural spring. No reservable private bath. Hours of the shared baths are not published. The FAQ says the open-air bath's temperature follows nature and is not adjusted.
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