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<\/a><\/p>\nAfter driving through the mountain roads from Aso toward Kurokawa Onsen, I headed a bit further to find a place I\u2019d heard about\u2014a small, rustic hot spring village where steam billows up from houses and fields. I knew it as “Takenoyu Onsen,” so I went to check it out. As I drove, I saw a tiny mountain village that looked exactly like it was “shrouded in steam.” This was clearly Takenoyu Onsen\u2014truly small and rustic. There’s a public bath called “Yukemuri Chaya,” so I decided to stop in. The parking lot was full, and for such a tiny village, it seemed quite popular! At the entrance, steam was gushing out with incredible force from a hole carved into a massive rock. It looks like you can use it for cooking things like vegetables. The bathing area was clean, and I was struck by the impressive roof with its heavy wooden beams. The water is clear, smooth, and felt amazing. I noticed a sauna, so I opened the door and was hit by a huge “whoosh” of steam. It turns out to be a mist sauna that uses the natural steam venting up from all over the village. Every so often, with a loud “roaring” sound, a massive amount of hot steam pumps in, turning everything inside the sauna pure white until you can’t see a thing. It seems the natural steam is piped directly in at intervals. It felt incredibly good.<\/p>\n
I’d heard about a small, rustic hot spring village where steam rises from houses and fields, just a bit past Kurokawa Onsen when driving from Aso. Knowing it was called “Takenoyu Onsen,” I decided to head there. As I drove along, a tiny mountain village came into view\u2014it was perfectly described as being blanketed in steam.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":624,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_locale":"en_US","_original_post":"https:\/\/onsen.thmiyake.com\/?p=623","footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5215","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-kyushu","en-US"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_wp_geo_latitude":"33.1557409","_wp_geo_longitude":"131.1356257","_wp_geo_map_settings":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/onsen.thmiyake.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5215","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/onsen.thmiyake.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/onsen.thmiyake.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/onsen.thmiyake.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/onsen.thmiyake.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5215"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/onsen.thmiyake.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5215\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5218,"href":"https:\/\/onsen.thmiyake.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5215\/revisions\/5218"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/onsen.thmiyake.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/624"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/onsen.thmiyake.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5215"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/onsen.thmiyake.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5215"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/onsen.thmiyake.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5215"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}<\/a> <\/a>
After my bath, I headed to the rest area and found everyone wrapped in blankets, napping here and there. Apparently, you’re free to take blankets from the closet and relax. Since I had some time to kill, it was the perfect way to spend it. Outside the window, a cat was looking in, wanting to join us. It was such a peaceful, laid-back vibe. It felt like local folks just dropping by for a break after work\u2014really mellow and cozy. I totally loved it. It\u2019s definitely a place I\u2019d want to visit again.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"