OnsenQuest

Prefectures / Tochigi

Kita Onsen Ryokan

北温泉旅館 · Nasu Onsen

Policy not published (day visit)Policy not published (overnight)

Can you bathe here with a tattoo?

This is the question we built the site around, so we answer it per situation.

Visiting for the day

They have not said

The tattoo policy is not stated publicly. Please contact the facility.

Staying overnight

They have not said

The tattoo policy is not stated publicly. Please contact the facility.

How it scores

Every onsen on this site is scored on the same five things.

ViewWaterComfortSettingAccess

Verified by the editor

View3.5
Water4
Comfort3
Setting5
Access2
—Somewhere to sit — not checked
△Anything else nearby — Nearby, but off to one side

A self-catering cure inn built between the Edo, Meiji and Showa periods, reached only on foot down a steep path, and the location used in the film Thermae Romae. Six baths for a 1,000-yen day ticket, including the huge open-air Oyogi-Yu swimming bath where a swimsuit is required - unusual in Japan and useful if communal nudity is the barrier. Rooms have no meals; there is a shared kitchen and bento can be ordered in advance. Rustic rather than polished: parts of the building are nearly two centuries old.

Every onsen on this site is scored against the same written rubric, and every score has been reviewed by the editor. The ones marked Visited were also bathed in personally.

The baths

Indoor bath

Tengu-no-Yu, the original bath, with a large tengu mask on the wall and a takase-yu pounding spout behind it. Men only from 8:30 to 17:30; mixed and for overnight guests only overnight.

Open to day visitors

Indoor bath

Me-no-Yu, the women's indoor bath, once reserved for the lord's household.

Open to day visitors

Indoor bath

Ai-no-Yu, separate men's and women's indoor baths in a Meiji-era building outside the main house. No dryer and no shampoo here.

Open to day visitors

Open-air bath

Kawara-no-Yu, separate men's and women's open-air baths beside the river.

Open to day visitors

Open-air bath

Oyogi-Yu, the swimming bath: 15 metres long and 10 metres wide, chest-deep, fed by water overflowing from the source down the hillside. Mixed bathing and a swimsuit is required, so it is the easiest bath here for a nervous first-timer.

Open to day visitors

Practical details

Day visits
Yes — you can bathe without staying overnight.
8:30-16:30 (building closes 17:30). Closed on Tuesdays from January to March.
Day visit price
¥1,000
Adults (13 and over) 1,000 yen, children aged 1-12 500 yen, under 1 free. Buy a ticket from the machine to the right of the entrance. Bath towels and shampoo are sold at the front desk; cash only.
Staying overnight
Yes
Getting there
At 151 Yumoto, Nasu Town, in a valley below the road to Nasu Ropeway. Drivers park at the Komadome waterfall viewpoint car park and walk down a steep path to the inn - the inn warns against wheeled suitcases and recommends proper shoes. By bus, take the Kanto Bus service up from Kuroiso or Nasu-Shiobara Station and walk down from the road.
Official website
kitaonsen.com

Visit the official website ↗

Book it

The links below are affiliate links — we may earn a commission if you book through them, at no extra cost to you. It never changes what we list or how we score it.

Check rates and availabilityAgoda ↗Compare on Booking.comBooking.com ↗Day-pass tickets and coupons for Nasu OnsenAsoview (Japanese-language site) ↗

Why Agoda for Japan: it lists a lot of ryokan and small inns that the Western booking sites never picked up, and it usually prices Japanese properties in yen, so you are not paying a conversion spread on top of the room rate. Worth comparing before you book — the difference on a ryokan is often larger than you would expect.

About the day-pass link: Asoview is the main place day-use onsen in Japan sell entry tickets and discount coupons in advance. It is a Japanese-only site, so use your browser’s translation — you show the ticket on your phone at the door.

What we have not confirmed

We would rather show a gap than guess.