Arima Onsen

On Saturday, Heather and I took a day trip to Arima which is just north of Kobe and famous for its hot springs (onsens). Heather and I have become onsen affectionados since our weekend at Beppu!

Half the fun of the day was getting there! We started on the special rapid train from Himeji to Kobe. In Kobe, we got on a cable car to take us up the mountain. It was steep climb!

At the top of the mountain we had magnificent views of Kobe and this ugly bird sculpture. The angular island is, of course, artificial. We took a bus ride around the top of the mountain. There was some snow up there, and there were lots of families taking the kids to a sledding slope. We continued to the Ropeway Station, where we took the ropeway down the other side of the mountain to Arima.In Arima, we started our onsen experience at Kinsen, so called because of its gold colored water (kin is the word for gold). Of course, it was really iron that made it this color, but it did have a certain shimmery tinge to it. After soaking for a while, we moved onto Ginsen. Gin means silver, but this water was clear. I've just looked on wikipedia for more information on Arima. It says the Ginsen water has radium and carbonate. Great, I soaked in radioactive water. A website (not wikipedia) claims:
Ginsen (Radioactive spring (Radon spring)) (Apparently there is some discrepancy whether it's radium or radon. But everyone seems to agree it's radioactive.)
Spring gas goes through the whole body by inhalation and improves your natural healing power. (I sat in the steam room at this onsen, unknowingly breathing in radioactive steam.)
～Ailments relieved by this spring water～
Myotonic spine disease, degenerative joint disease, chronic multiple joint disease, degenerative spine disease, chronic gout, joint and muscle rheumatism, mild peripheral arterial circulation disorder, menopausal discomfort, bronchial asthma, etc.

Of course we couldn't take photos inside the onsen, but there was a little hot spring along the road side, showing the "kinsen" water. The crows on the rock are fake. There are a lot of fake crow statues in Japan.

And we peeked into a Buddhist temple where I snapped these photos.

It was a nice relaxing day, although very chilly and snowy. We had a nice Indian dinner back in Kobe (Kobe is known for its international restaurants) and bought some chu-hai (a sparkly cocktail sold in a can) for the train ride back to Himeji!