Oyado Eitaro (Hirayu Onsen)

A small family-run Hirayu inn by the bus terminal where a Gifu master chef's Hida-beef kaiseki and three untouched hot springs — with two free 24-hour private baths — earn near-perfect scores; the rooms are plain and small, with no baths of their own

Oyado Eitaro is a small family-run inn a minute's walk from the Hirayu Onsen bus terminal, opened about 45 years ago by Mitsuhiro Sakamaki, then head chef at a Hirayu ryokan and holder of Gifu's 'master of cuisine' title. A second-generation chef trained in ryōtei kitchens now cooks alongside the founder, and the family runs the house with the okami. The inn admits it has little glamour and no polished service; the draw is food and water. Dinner is an 11–12-course kaiseki sent out dish by dish from a kitchen behind a noren curtain: marbled horse sashimi, salt-grilled ayu, A5 Hida-beef sirloin grilled over charcoal on a magnolia leaf with house miso, and a Hida-beef kamameshi. Breakfast brings tofu made each morning and all-you-can-eat egg on rice. The baths use three sources with no added water, heating, recirculation or disinfectant, including a sulphurous spring added in March 2026, and two private baths with indoor and open-air tubs are free and open 24 hours. Japanese guests rate it 4.9 across 508 reviews on one major site (dinner 5.0, rooms 4.4) and 4.75 across 299 on another (dinner 4.94). Bloggers from 2022 to 2026 and 2026 reviewers describe more food than they could finish, dishes arriving piping hot, warm staff and baths almost to themselves, and many say it is hard to book. The complaints are about the building: plain, smallish nine-mat rooms with no bath, cramped shared changing rooms, voices from the private baths heard in the discounted rooms above them until 23:00 (May 2026), yellowed yukata and slippery slippers (August 2026), and food some found salty or rich. Two-meal stays run about ¥16,000–26,000 per person.