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With Okihiro Takahashi and Itsuo Kusadome, shareholders of Tsuru no yu Onsen, in front of the entrance — With *Okihiro Takahashi* and Itsuo Kusadome, shareholders of *Tsuru no yu Onsen*, in front of the entrance

We visited “Tsuru no yu” in Tsuru, Ebino, Miyazaki. Tsuru no yu is 鶴の湯 in Japanese. Even the locals don’t know the origin of the name, however, they assume that, as the address is Tsuru (水流 in Japanese), this onsen was namad as Tsrunoyu (水流の湯, which means Water of Tsuru), and then the Kanji character might be change from 水流 to 鶴. Then, finally result in Tsuru no yu (鶴の湯).

You can find a small blue lovely box in the entrance. Put the entrance fee into this box to take a bath.

This is the dressing room, it is well maintained. You can put your clothes into a compartment. Note that there are no lockers.

In the bathroom, you will find a big bathtub. It is separated into two tubs, the front tub contains warm water and the back tub hot water. Women’s bathroom has the same design. Most of frequent visitors come after watching live Sumo on TV, and they talk about the Sumo matches on that day while taking a bath.

The water is sodium bicarbonate saline spring, and is clear and transparent. As the temperature is approx. 50°C (122°F), it is adjusted by controlling the amount of hot spring water or adding cool water.

Tsutomu (the name of the man in the bath) is 83 years old and has been living in Ebino for a couple of decades. He comes to Tsuru no yu Onsen every day.

Okihiro (left) and Itsuo (right) are shareholders of Tsuru no yu Onsen. Okihiro works as an accountant and Itsuo works as a director. This onsen has been running from the Meiji era, and used to be a part of a local school, it was an onsen for the students. When this onsen was contributed from the public office to the local community, 35 families shared stocks of the onsen, and it is still shared and maintained by 12 local families. The members work together to maintain Tsuru no yu Onsen clean and safe.

Finally, we will let you know the motto of Tsuru no yu Onsen.

“Be considerate to others, that's the aesthetics in the bath”

From this motto, we can imagine how the locals have been living with this onsen. In Ebino, four or five public onsen bathhouses close every year due to the decrease of visitors. Although it is an inevitable trend of the times, we hope Tsuru no yu Onsen will remain in the future.