Kama-no-yu Onsen

Kama-no-yu Onsen in Matsumoto city, Nagano Prefecture, serves Japan's most celebrated castle town on the edge of the Northern Alps, where the sixteenth-century Matsumoto Castle, nicknamed the Crow Castle for its elegant black exterior, stands as one of Japan's twelve surviving original castle keeps and the visual centrepiece of a city that combines outstanding historical heritage with access to some of Japan's finest mountain landscapes. The siliceous spring water provides therapeutic bathing for the visitors, mountaineers, and skiing enthusiasts who make Matsumoto their base for exploring the Northern Alps, the Japan Alps Museum, and the extraordinary Kamikochi alpine valley upstream in the mountains to the west. The combination of castle architecture, mountain landscape, local lacquerware tradition, and accessible onsen makes Matsumoto one of Japan's most complete and rewarding provincial cities.