Kinosaki

We recently celebrated our three year anniversary! Unfortunately for us, we were both sick on our anniversay AND on valentine's day (although Valentine's Krispy Kreme's were a wonderful treat), so we couldn't celebrate. However, the next weekend, Jonny spoiled me by booking us into a traditional Japanese 旅館 ryokan in Kinosaki: a magical onsen town about 3 hours from Osaka. And it was one of my highlights of Japan so far.

Japanese people view Kinosaki as the ultimate onsen town. It is a peaceful, relaxing place where everybody comes to enjoy the seven public onsen. If you are unfamiliar with Japanese onsen, it's like a really really hot bath with natural water from hot springs. Men and women go to separate baths and everyone is NAKED! Some baths are inside, some are outside and are often decorated or themed. I love how the Japanese are so comfortable with nakedness; the onsen culture is so unlike anything we have back home. Can you imagine getting naked with all your friends and hanging out in a hot bath for hours?! But it's seriously great.

We arrived at Kinosaki in the morning but the ryokans do not open for check in until 3pm. We spent a leisurely few hours strolling around, eating lunch and enjoying the peace. We even drank the hot spring water - which tasted awful! But look at the lovely ceramic cups they provide you with to drink from. In England someone would definitely steal them...

When 3pm arrived, we practically ran to the ryokan. I had such high expectations for staying in a traditional guesthouse and boy were they met. We arrived, were led up to our room by an old woman in a kimono and proceeded to check in. She spoke no English and Jonny's excellent (and far better than mine!!) Japanese meant it was a smooth experience. She commenced to dress us in traditional Yukata that everyone wears when travelling between bath houses. Jonny was too tall so she had to go find a a bigger robe! Every time she left the room she knelt down to slide the doors with such grace. We drank green tea before heading to the onsen.

After 3pm, the whole mood of the town changes. Everybody walks around in their yukata and it feels like some new Murakami universe that we have all been pulled into.

Looking babyfaced! Check out the shoes we had to wear - they are much harder to walk in than stilettos! 

After relaxing for hours, it was time to return to the ryokan for dinner. When we were walking around the town and relaxing in the onsen it was snowing! Such a magical time.

Kinosaki is also famous for some special crabs and, luckily for us, it is crab season. We came back to our room which had been set up for dinner, and our wonderful host brought in two huge crabs and various other Japanese foods.

The crab was raw but we cooked it ourselves in a broth we had on the table. Wow, it was really amazing. A very special meal, although I don't want to eat crab for a while now - it was a lot of crab meat!

After dinner we went back out for a late night soak and return to the futons set up for bed time in our room.

The next morning breakfast was served in our room, a magnificent collection of raw fish, rice and various other things I did not recognise - because sometimes cornflakes just won't do... We went for one last session in a different bath house and then strolled around the town. We found a beautiful temple.

And these mysterious stairs... Our curiosity led us up...

We started walking and THEY WOULD NOT END! 500 stairs later we had reached the top... and were awarded with a great view of the town. We also saw another beautiful temple and this pagoda hiding between the trees.

Kinosaki is a magical place and it was a very romantic way to celebrate our anniversary. I hope I make it back one day.