Kyushu During New Years

Hi All,

At present, I am going to be in Kyushu between December 30th and January 12th via Fukuoka Airport (I've already booked a car for the 14 days). I've already travelled reasonably extensively around Fukuoka, Oita and Saga and will spend most of my time in Kumamoto Prefecture.

I'm after some suggestions on possible locations to visit which will have a nice mix of nature and onsens in Saga or Fukuoka Prefecture around December 30th-Jan 2nd which will not be too adversely affected by the general tourist attraction shutdown over New Years.

I'm stating locations I've already visited in Saga & Fukuoka so you know I've already visited them:

Fukuoka: Kitakyushu, Fukuoka, Daizaifu, Kurume & Yanagawa
Saga: Saga, Takeo, Urushima, Karatsu, Yobuko, Yoshinogiri Park

Note that any suggestions in Saga particularly would be much appreciated

Kinda the opposite direction you were thinking, but thinking Amagase. About one hours drive from Fukuoka airport and an hours from Beppu/Oita. About an hour from Kurume also. Allows access to inland Oita eg Hita and Kusu regions and inland northern Kumamoto prefecture.

You've given me some interesting ideas. I've already visited Hita which I highly enjoyed but it's also close to Aso and a few other locations. What do you think of the quality of the water at Amagase Onsen?

bump....

still after any other suggestions.....

so what do you seek? good onsen recommendations anywhere in kyushu? (i would have those, but not know which areas are of special interest to you)

Hi Glimpigumpi,

I'm looking for onsens and nature (basically easy walks), with a particular emphasis on good quality onsen water.

Mt. Aso has a lot of good trails although some are closed due to the out-gassing of Nakadake, and a lot of onsen around the mountain. One I used to go to is Jigoku-onsen because it was isolated and had a hot spring waterfall with a rotenburo that was free. The rotenburo is still there but the waterfall has all the water going to a couple of minshuku/ryokan and you have to pay now even for the rotenburo. It's still a nice area with nothing else around.
http://jigoku-onsen.co.jp/
https://www.google.com/maps/place/%E5%9C%B0%E7%8D%84%E6%B8%A9%E6%B3%89...

I've stayed at some of the big places in the Aso caldera, but only on business and I haven't gone back on my own as I don't like the huge onsen complexes with bowling alleys and 10 karaoke boxes.

In the next park south, Kirishima, there are several isolated onsen on the both the north and south mountainsides that you can find on google maps. I don't remember the name of the place below Kirishima Shrine (Tozanguchi-onsen?), but it was in the small town area and had clear water with small white crystals floating around in it.
http://www4.synapse.ne.jp/o-tozan/
There's also a yakiniku place in the town that usually has inoshishi and sika on the menu.

Kirishima has good hikes also except Shinmoe-dake and Io-san have been active lately closing some trail sections.

i excluded well known places like kurokawa, since you are aware of them anyhow for sure

Saga:
* http://www.mifuneyamarakuen.jp (but maybe not nice in Winter dunno)

Nagasaki:
* 海上露天風呂波の湯茜
* Unzen Hell - 雲仙地獄
* 小地獄温泉館

Fukuoka:
琴ひら温泉ゆめ山水
山荘 天水

Oita:
* Usa Jingu 宇佐神宮 (some temple)
* 奥みょうばん山荘
* 七福温泉 宇戸の庄
* 山里の湯
* 山荘 やまの彩
* 赤川温泉
* 山吹水源

Kumamoto:
* 水前寺成趣園
* 梅の木轟公園
* 金波楼
* 新温泉

Kagoshima:
* 霧島神宮
* 妙見石原荘
* 栄之尾温泉
* 砂むし会館砂楽
* 川辺温泉

i also highly recommend to read this page if you are interested in onsen in kyushu
https://en.unknownjapan.net
(they even sell a book, which is great and where you can get many inspirations off the beaten track)

I've stayed at Jigoku onsen - ryokan Seifuso - and I loved it.

The muddy water in the covered mixed-bathing rotemburo was great - and the water temperature changed quite a lot between afternoon, evening, and the next morning, which was good. There are also other (segregated) baths with different water (which, when I tried them, were a bit on the hot side for me).

The food was also excellent, with much of it being fresh local game and veggies that you grilled over your own sort of raised-table-irori type thing. I don't want to give the game away, but the dining hall (a very atmospheric old barn) has an awesome feature that they use at breakfast time.

If you're in that area, I'd heartily recommend staying there. I can't remember whether we booked via the ryokan's website, using a translation engine, or whether we found a way to book it in English via rakuten or japanican. It's pretty remote, so you'd need a car.

We drove from Kumamoto, but it's at least a 2 hr drive, and the first hour or so driving out of Kumamoto towards Aso is a bit dull (and speed limits are slow), so if we did it again I might see if we couldn't take a train to Aso and then hire a car from there. The next day we drove on to Kurokawa, which was relatively nearby, and quite a nice drive.

Does anyone have any experience with booking Jigoku onsen??

I do!

I checked back through my emails, and it appears that I booked it via Rakuten (although I imagine I put the Japanese website http://jigoku-onsen.co.jp/ through Chrome first, to see the prices and the sort of meal plans available).

I just checked it on Rakuten for you and it was showing as "temporarily unavailable", so I opened the hotel's website in Chrome and saw the message on the front page that the inn suffered from the April 16 earthquake and is temporarily closed at present. They mention a facebook page, which might also be useful to look up (maybe you could follow them to get news updates?)

Thanks for the info Winter Visitor. I did notice that there was no availability on Rakutan, Booking and Japanican but could not get more info. This of course includes looking at dates when they are normally quiet (mid June for example).....

I'll keep a look out in later in the year and book something with free cancellation as a backup.....