JAPANEXILE

Although my first onsen was during my Noboribetsu weekend I thought onsen deserved an update of its own, its that important. For those that do not know japanese onsen is hotsprings by any other name, there are differences in the experience however. Onsen is a pretty big thing out in Japan, especially up here in Hokkaido where the largest venues are, and in fact entire towns are built solely for onsen. My first onsen experience was over in the aptly named Toya-onsen. I was a little nervous going in, no matter how you think of it, its a little weird stripping down and getting in a big bath with a large group of other men. Although now that I’ve been and done its taken on a “what was the big deal” status. There is a whole ritual to onsen, its not just the bath part. Once stripped down you go and sit down on a little stool in front of a shower and scrub yourself down for 10minutes or so, using the bucket in front of you, a little towel, and lots of soap. Once sparklingly clean you brave the near freezing temperatures outside and hop into the baths themselves. Once you get over the initial “Dear God this is unbearably hot” phase its very relaxing, the the contrast between the unbearable cold outside the bath and the unbearable heat inside is pretty nice. I’ve been to a couple nice onsen places now, and I’ve enjoyed it more each time. All I can say now is bring on the snow, as I think the onsen will become even nicer as a haven away from the cold.

Update: Having now been to Onsen whilst the snow is falling I can safely say there are few things more relaxing. Although slipping around on the ice covered path in the nude ain’t particularly fun. Not surprisingly not photos for this one. Think people might get the wrong idea if I went in with my camera.

This entry was posted on Friday, November 23rd, 2007 at 1:12 am and is filed under Japan. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.