Tenzan no Yu — Restaurant in Kyoto

Entry fee on Saturday 1200 JPY including towel hire, which includes one big towel and one hand towel. You pay at the end and I believe it’s a day fee i.e there is no time limit.

Tattoos are prohibited - covering them with tape is not sufficient if obvious / visible. They ask you if you have any when entering.

Shoes go into a free locker, and then you swap that key for a changing room locker key at reception. You can take a small towel into the Onsen area with you, if you wish. Men and women are separate.

Seemed to be barely any foreigners, so this appears to be a true Japanese Onsen experience which we were pleased about! Didn’t feel out of place / observed. Mostly everyone is just minding their own business.

Shower / rinse before you go into any of the pools. There are multiple hot pool areas at varying heats, some indoor and some outdoor, some with massaging jets. Hotter ones are around 40 degrees.

There is one cold pool at 17 degrees just behind the rinse station that you encounter when first entering the area. Very nice to dunk in between hot pools.

There is a huge ‘sauna theatre’ which has a tv that was showing the football. Very popular! Wait for the water taps to turn on and drip onto the hot stones at either end of the room - the heat then increases quite rapidly to a peak which is seriously hot!

From what I could tell, there was only one ‘natural’ hot spring pool of sodium-chloride which is the brown coloured outdoor pool, coming from 1200m below ground.

When finished, there are shower stations at the back of the main pool area with shampoo, body wash etc.

All pretty easy to navigate as an English speaker. Most signs within the facility are bilingual....

After a long day of walking around all over Kyoto, kick back at a local onsen to revitalise your senses and rejuvinate. Proper onsen spas in Japan are essentially like full-on wellness centres and perhaps none are more famous in Kyoto than Tenzan no Yu. It also happens to be super tourist-friendly with the reception staff speaking decent English and bilingual signages everywhere.

With its natural hot spring water coming from 1,200m underground, it is well-equipped with nice indoor and outdoor bath facilities, including some interesting and innovative ones that involve the use of low-level electric currents that apparently have therapeutic effects (known as 電気風呂 denkiburo).

For those who have never been to an onsen/sento before, the drill is usually the same (although sometimes with minor variations):

1)Lock your shoes inside an empty shoe locker and take the Shoe Locker Key.

2)Pass the Shoe Locker Key to the reception and they will exchange it for your Onsen Locker Key (this you need to keep with you at all times, even in the baths, hence they are usually waterproof and come with a elastic band that you can strap around your wrist)

3)Go into the onsen locker room and store your stuff into your assigned locker. Strip off all items of clothing before heading into the onsen proper.

4)When you are done, just reverse steps 1-3.

**Take note, like most onsens/sentos in Japan, Tenzan no Yu also has a strict policy against admitting anyone with tattoos into the onsen due to its age-old associations with the Yakuza.

When you are done with the baths, grab a meal at the adjacent dining hall, which serves everything from sushi, sashimi, yakitori, ramen,...

Very good experience as a foreigner. Lots of English signs and the ladies at the reception also spoke English. This onsen has more a luxury feel to it. It has an indoor and outdoor area. The outdoor area has the really hot pools with the mineral water plus a few individual baths. Indoors there are several hydromassage pools (one of which has electricity), a hot pool, a cold pool, and the big sauna. Every 2 hours some guys will come in the sauna and pour water over the heaters and crank the heat to overdrive and blow air over you.

To clear up what you're supposed to do, first you come and leave your shoes in a small locker and take the key. Take that key to the reception and there you will drop your key and get another one for the bigger locker (no payment yet). Then you go to the locker area, remove all your clothes and put them in the locker. Take only your towel. After that go to the indoor area of the spa and in the back of the hall there are around 20 showers. Sit down in front of one of the mirrors and wash yourself with the shower, soap, shampoo etc are provided. After that feel free to explore the place and test every pool. If you ever get sweaty during your stay don't just jump in the pools, but first rinse in the showers or poor a small bucket of water on top near the entrance. Be aware that any additional services or food you will have to pay at the end after you return...