Shirama Onsen Awa-Ikeda Tokushima
- Location
- Awa-Ikeda, Tokushima, Shikoku, Japan
- Water type
- bicarbonate
- Temperature
- 41 °C
- pH
- 8
Water profile
Relaxing — deep, immediate muscle release.
Loaded with major ions — the essential minerals (Ca, Mg).
Soft water — natural, classic buoyancy.
Shirama Onsen Awa-Ikeda Tokushima is a thermal bathing facility in the Awa-Ikeda area of Miyoshi City, Tokushima Prefecture, situated at the western end of the famous Iya Valley, one of Japan's three great hidden regions known as kakurezato, a dramatic landscape of deep, V-shaped gorges carved through ancient crystalline schist rock where the Yoshino River and its tributaries have created a canyon landscape of extraordinary geological and scenic power that hid fugitive Heike clan warriors after their defeat in the Genpei War of the 12th century. The valley's traditional vine bridges (kazurabashi) woven from mountain vines and replaced every three years in a ceremony maintained for over 800 years, the dramatically situated thatched farmhouses on near-vertical slopes, and the dense cedar and beech forest of the Tsurugi-san mountain massif create one of Shikoku's most visually dramatic and historically evocative landscapes. The sodium-bicarbonate thermal waters here warm visitors who have explored the Iya Valley's deep gorges and vine bridges, offering restoration in the western gateway community that connects the hidden valley's ancient refuge landscape to the modern Shikoku transportation network.