Epic Golden Week Adventure - Beppu

After taking the overnight ferry from drizzly Osaka we awoke to an absolutely stunning day in Beppu, found our hostel fine and were luckily able to check in a bit early.

Picking up a one-day-bus pass (which also gets you discounts to some of the main attractions) we set out to explore as much of the city as we could and although we got a bit lost eventually made our way to Beppu Onsen Hoyoland to spend the morning relaxing in this slightly run down but very atmospheric onsen. I don't have any pictures of the inside because of course cameras are not allowed but the most exciting part of this place was the mixed-gender-outdoor-mud-bath. Remembering in Japan that you don't wear togs in hot springs, it was quite an experience, although there is a sheltered area for women to submerge themselves before going outside (and he mud is thick so you can't see anything anyway) the genders are segregated by bamboo poles just above the water but it was nice to be able to mingle (because our travelling group is three girls and one guy) and be outside under the beautiful blue sky.

After that we set off on "jigoku meguri" (literally: tour of the hells) which is a whole bunch of different geothermal activities to experience. In the Kannawa area we visited oniishibouzu-jigoku (mud pools), umi-jigoku (sea hell), yama-jigoku (not worth visiting especially if you dont want to see the small zoo where the animals dont have a lot of space), kamado-jigoku (kitchen hell where you can try onsen tamago), oniyama-jigoku (has crocodiles in confined spaces) and shiraike-jigoku (white pond hell).

Took the bus to the last two hells which imho you could miss if you were running out of time - chinoike-jigoku (blood pool - although there was a red one at umi-jigoku that was more vibrant) and the tatsumaki-jigoku (geyser that had nothing on pohutu) but you could definitely see why this is Rotorua's sister city. The beautiful weather there really made Beppu a spectacular city to walk around and I think it would have been quite a different experience if it had been raining.

That night we wanted to take a sand bath at Takegawara Onsen but due to some mis-communication (or bad timing) the lady told us to go away and come back because they were full at the moment, but when we came back all the tickets for that day were sold out and we were leaving early the next morning (before they opened). So settled for some toriten for dinner and bathed at the small ekimae koto onsen and checked out some information for our Mount Aso adventure the next day. Will definitely have to get back to Beppu one day to try onsen pudding, sand bath and a few of the lesser known onsens up in the mountains - it was a beautiful city.