Hello, we are currently planning our first trip to Japan and would like to do a spa/onsen relaxation day while visiting Kyoto. Id like to visit a ‘real’ onsen, and it seems like you usually have to go to more mountainous areas (correct me if I’m wrong) to find those so Ive been looking at day trips. I see lots of mentions of Kinosaki, and while it seems amazing, 5 hours of the day being wasted on train rides is a little hard to swallow.
Was curious if anyone could suggest whether it is worth bitting the bullet on the travel time, or would it be better to find somewhere closer to Kyoto? Thanks!
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The closest would be Kurama Onsen or Ohara, followed by Arima Onsen in Kobe.
While Kinosaki Onsen encourages somewhat onsen-crawling – it is not a day trip destination from Kyoto, especially since places Gero Onsen, Awara Onsen, Kaga Onsen, Atami, or Ito, which nobody would consider as day trip destinations from Kyoto have the same or lower travel time.
So, if you are interested in Kinosaki Onsen, book a night and one of the ryokans there.
What do you mean by “real onsen” anyway ? There is actually some onsen in Kyoto itself, so if you just want to soak in a onsen, then you could always do it there, but of course there is other are much more known for their onsen.
It’s not as if you would spend the whole day in a onsen either, you would usually soak for 10-20 minutes. Of course, going to a place like Kinosaki that have several onsen, you might end up going to 3-4 in the whole day,
I would say that Kinosaki is great, the ambiance is really cool, but I do not see it as a daytrip, would be much better as an overnight trip, spend a night in a ryokan with kaiseki meal. When you check-in, they will give you a pass to the public onsen as well a yukata that you can wear to go from one onsen to the other.
And no, I do not think there is especially a correlation between mountain and onsen. It’s just that Japan is 80% mountain, so obviously a lot of onsen will be on the mountain.
Kinosaki is great and the train is under 2.5 hours if you take the direct one. It’s a bit more (5k) but nicely appointed and very convenient. As a day trip…. nah. Much better as an overnight. The baths on offer vary slightly by day as well, so an afternoon, evening, and morning dip mixed with great food would be my rec. Closer in, there are a couple places in Ohara I like and Kurama was fine when it was open, but Kinosaki is a proper onsen town and a great experience. The train ride is gorgeous — I really liked the scenery.
Spend a night in Kinosaki. It’s a quiet and welcome reprieve from the typical busy destinations in Osaka, Kyoto, and Tokyo. The train ride over should be novel as well. Recommend!
I had a really good time in Kinosaki. Small chill town that is very beautiful and good hiking spots nearby. I’d say it is worth the train ride from Kyoto. Spend a night there and get the full experience.
The only trouble I had was a big earthquake hit Kyoto the day I was supposed to leave and it shut down the rail network for a day.
If you want to save the time, Fufunoyu is a perfectly pleasant onsen with an outdoor bath set right in Arashiyama. Of course, if you want a more authentic onsen town experience then you’ll have to take a trip to one of the other places mentioned.
Loved kinosaki onsen, worth the effort IMO
Yes, worth it. Did it a few years ago from Osaka. Find a nice ryokan for onsen and Kaiseki.
Kinosaki is awesome but I wouldn’t go unless you stay the night. Half the fun is getting the pass book or buying the illustrated post cards and trying to “collect” the stamp from each onsen. If you stay in a Ryokan you will get a pass for all 7 as part of your accomodations, and they will give you a yukata you can wear around town.
Kinosaki isn’t the wintery escape of like Ginzan though. Very little snow, mostly cold and wet. Still hot water feels great and the town is famous for crab that will definitely taste yummy after a cold wet day.
I live in Kyoto, love a good onsen, and have pondered similar questions to this more times than I can count. Right now, unfortunately, there is no simple answer.
Kinosaki is genuinely great, and one of the notably few onsen towns I’ve seen that is actually geared towards day trips rather than staying the night; it feels wonderfully alive during the day, not something that I’ve seen that often in other ‘standalone’ onsen towns. Also, the amount of time you’d likely spend there if you’re doing a day trip – looking at the train times, perhaps five and a half, six and a half hours – would let you fit in pretty much all the onsen at a relaxed-ish pace or a good majority at a pace that’s relaxed even for anxious bastards like me. On the other hand, yep, that’s a long train ride to use your precious Japan time for.
So let’s look at the alternatives. First question – how onsen do you want your onsen? As others have already pointed out, there are plenty of regular sento in Kyoto city itself, many of which are confusingly marketed as onsen when they aren’t, so Japanese bathing itself can be done on a whim as part of a day trip. But hey, it’s not the same, is it?
If you’re using the *technical* definition of onsen, i.e. water heated at least partly naturally rather than in the normal household manner, a few sento actually have made themselves natural onsen by digging so deep they strike hot water. I don’t know the names of all of them, but Tensho-no-yu 天翔の湯, in the inner suburbs along Shichijo-dori, is certainly one of them. At a mere 15 minutes by bus from Kyoto Station, this is likely your most convenient pedantically-defined onsen, but I would hesitate to recommend it to tourists of the non-pedantic and non-pushed-for-time variety. It’s a pretty good sento if you’re local, I sometimes go a bit further than my actual local one to visit it, but if you’re in Kyoto and want to visit one sento, then make it Funaoka Onsen (again, not an onsen, despite the name).
Right! Mountains! I’m guessing you want the *actual* onsen experience. The one you see on the tourist brochures with yukata and actual nature and all that jazz. Kinosaki certainly delivers, but we’re talking about alternatives here. You were right, by the way; yep, you aren’t gonna get that in the city, unless the really posh ryokan are doing something I don’t know about because I’m not that posh. (Spoiler alert, they probably are.) In a normal year, the answer is pretty clear: Kurama Onsen, in the touristy-but-still-lovely mountain village of Kurama which even has a train line down into Kyoto city, gets you right into nature with its big spartan outdoor bath. Unfortunately, it closed during one of the states of emergency in early 2021 and there are apparently still no signs of life in the area. Dammit dammit dammit. As far as I am aware, there are four other notable onsen clusters around Kyoto: Arima, Ogoto, Yunohana, and Ohara. So I’ll summarise the pros and cons of them.
**Arima** (75 mins by direct highway bus from Kyoto Station)
*Pros*: The most famous of the four and likely the largest. Easy to combine with a trip to Kobe which is right next door.
*Cons*: Seemingly overdeveloped; in almost three years of living here the idea of actually going there hasn’t appealed too much. The marquee baths are a bit pricey.
**Ogoto** (20 mins by JR Kosei Line from Kyoto Station, then another 20 on foot)
*Pros*: The closest by quite a ways unless you’re staying around Arashiyama or Higashiyama. The cheapest to get to. The only one of these four that isn’t in a forested mountain valley, if lakes happen to be more your vibe.
*Cons*: Seems pretty urban. Other than the lake itself, the scenery not visible from the onsen is unlikely to be memorable. Unlikely to see many people wandering around in yukata.
**Yunohana** (about 60 mins to the edge of the valley by train to Kameoka and then bus; will be shorter if starting from Arashiyama or Nijo)
*Pros*: The most remote of the four, if that’s your vibe. All the onsen neatly arranged along one small road with what appears to be a tourist information centre at the end. You’re not gonna see another foreigner for miles. Some of the buildings look, uh, interesting, architecture-wise.
*Cons*: The same as the pros except viewed the other way round – for example, I would be surprised if anyone there spoke more than rudimentary English.
**Ohara** (50-60 mins from Kyoto Station by metro+bus or Sanjo Keihan by direct bus, shorter if you’re staying in a northern area along the Karasuma metro line, then another 10-15 mins walk to the onsen)
*Pros*: Right next to a bunch of notable mountain temples, so there’s more to do than just onsen. Technically in Kyoto city, so people might be more likely to lay on the tradition.
*Cons*: There are only one or two ryokan that do day trips, so it would be more spending a lot of time at one place rather than hopping around a bunch like in Kinosaki.
Personally, I would either go to Kinosaki or perhaps try [this one in Ohara](https://www.ohara-sansou.com/higaeri/index_e.php) (I haven’t been there, so if it turns out to be shite, please don’t blame me). But we’re all different, so you might be thinking along entirely different lines. Oh, and sorry for the wall o’ text. Let me know what you think though, I’m always interested in how others react to Kyoto!
Spent a night in a Ryokan north of Kyoto in a place called Kyotango that was pretty reasonably priced. That was a nice experience
I would recommend staying the night, and even better staying at a Ryokan or onsen hotel. If you are in an onsen town you can check out the public onsen.
My main point is that onsen are about relaxing so struggling on a train there and back and rushing it totally defeats the point.
Also, Hakone is also near Tokyo for onsen as another option.