Ryokan Zenya

The onsen has several pools inside and outdoors, and the whole place looks new, very clean, and classy. There are plenty of wash stations with accessories and lotions, and the water pressure is really good. Outside, there’s a nice place to lie down for a nap or just watch TV.

Hirayama has a nice onsen, renovated in 2018. ¥800 felt like a good price for it.

The bath was great, though the lotions they provided weren’t very good, so I’d bring my own. I had lunch at Kazaguruma and ordered a Kuroge Wagyu set meal and a steak rice bowl. The bowl came extremely late, and I’m sure they’d forgotten it. It didn’t come with a separate sauce either. The food tasted good, but considering the high price, that was disappointing. I also didn’t think watercress between the meat and rice was necessary. It just smelled bad.

The big tub makes this a good place for groups, and the facilities are clean and well equipped. I found the ¥880 day-use price reasonable, even though some people consider it expensive. The range of baths and the cleanliness made it worthwhile. The indoor water comes out strongly and runs hot, while the open-air bath is lukewarm. I found both relaxing, as well as the mist sauna. Its mist is coarser than usual, which I personally found refreshing and enjoyable. Other places often have finer, mist-like spray, so this felt distinctive. The water is strongly alkaline, with a pH of 9.57, and my skin felt noticeably smooth as soon as I got in. There isn’t much metasilicic acid or bicarbonate ion, but the water feels soft and smooth on the skin. It barely irritated my skin and left it feeling smooth for a long time, without tightness afterward. It was very easy to bathe in, like an alkaline beauty bath. I hope the place draws more visitors from other prefectures and becomes more of a tourist destination.