Hōheikyō Onsen

I did a road trip with some friends, and this time it was to the Hōheikyō onsen. It’s about an hour drive away from Niseko, but we made a quick stop at the Fukidashi Park. This area is a park with a nice pond and a waterfall. But one of the special features is the runoff from the waterfall has a bunch of spouts where you can collect and drink fresh mountain spring water for free! I had a quick taste of the water and it was refreshing.

 

We continued on to our final destination: the Hōheikyō onsen. This place was really busy when we arrived, and we got in line, but soon realized we were in line for the restaurant. We got to the onsen line, and was soon bathing outside in hot mineral water. Onsen’s in Japan are quite a unique experience. There are inside pools, but usually the outside ones are most popular. Especially in the winter, you have the cold air, the nature of the landscape, and sometime even animals are around. I saw a few deer while I was bathing outside this time. After about a 45 minute soak, we are finished so we get dressed and go back downstairs to get in line for the restaurant. This onsen has a very special one: an authentic Indian experience. The kitchen has see through windows so you can see the chefs making the naan bread in the tandoori oven. You order first, and then they will direct you to a table and you wait there. There are great views of the nature outside because of the big glass windows. They call your number and you grab the food from the counter. The first thing I notice is that the naan is so big! each one of us gets our own naan that is bigger than my face.