Gifu Hashima Onsen

Hashima, in the western Gifu Prefecture on the Kiso River delta where the Kiso, Nagara, and Ibi rivers converge in the Nobi plain, is a community in the extraordinarily flat river island landscape created by centuries of river engineering in the world's most ambitious pre-industrial water management system, whose complex network of levees, river islands, and drainage channels defines the unique geography of the western Gifu lowland. Gifu Hashima Onsen draws on chloride-rich thermal waters from the geological resources of the western Gifu river delta zone, offering warm restorative baths in a river island community whose extraordinary flat waterscape, traditional delta farming culture, and easy access to the Nagoya metropolitan area via the JR Tokaido Line create a distinctively low-lying and watery spa setting in the Nobi plain. The extraordinary Nobi plain river island landscape of levees, waterways, and flat paddy fields, the historic river port town heritage of the Kiso River delta communities, and the easy JR Tokaido Line access to Nagoya and westward to Maibara and the Shinkansen network make Hashima a conveniently connected and geographically distinctive spa destination in the western Gifu river delta.