Kinugawa Onsen Hotel Manyotei

Kinugawa Onsen Asaya Hotel

鬼怒川温泉 あさやホテル

Kinugawa's big showpiece inn, founded in 1888: a soaring lobby atrium with glass lifts and a pipe organ, a 13th-floor open-air bath and a 100-dish buffet, with an onsen tub in every room — but the spring is heated and recirculated, the buffet gets crowded, and valley-side rooms look out on derelict hotels

• Habitaciones con onsen privado
• Ryokan históricos

Kinugawa Onsen Sanraku

鬼怒川温泉 山楽

A polished 49-room inn where every room is 74㎡ and looks down on the Kinugawa gorge, with kaiseki served in your room or a private dining room and standout service — but the baths are shared and recirculated, every room is a smoking room, and the 1991 building shows its age

• Cerca de Tokio

Kinugawa Onsen Isshinkan

鬼怒川温泉 一心舘

A century-old, 39-room family inn with its own spring, a nine-tub 'kurhaus' bath, a warm-spring swimming pool and dinners served in private rooms — the building is tired, the water runs lukewarm, and some river-view rooms look out at an abandoned hotel

• Cerca de Tokio

Kinugawa Onsen Hana no Yado Matsuya

鬼怒川温泉 花の宿 松や

A 1950s riverside inn with river views from almost every room, a rock open-air bath right above the Kinugawa gorge and its own path down to the riverbank — good-value kaiseki, but an ageing building, musty smells and patchy cleaning

• Cerca de Tokio

Hidatei Hanaougi

飛騨亭 花扇

Takayama's crowd-pleaser: a wood-built, tatami-floored inn with its own silky spring piped into most rooms' open-air baths, one attendant from arrival to farewell and Hida-beef kaiseki in private dining rooms — though the water is recirculated and heated, and the cheapest rooms have no onsen at all

Honjin Hiranoya Kofukan

飛騨高山 本陣平野屋 光風館

Kachoan's larger, cheaper sister by the red Nakabashi bridge: a taiko drum to greet you, names remembered and Hida-beef kaiseki in private dining rooms — but the rooms are plain, none of the in-room baths is described as onsen, and women get no open-air bath