Narutaki Onsen Tokushima
- Location
- Naruto, Tokushima, Shikoku, Japan
- Water type
- sodium chloride
- Temperature
- 41 °C
- pH
- 7.3
Water profile
Relaxing — deep, immediate muscle release.
Loaded with major ions — the essential minerals (Ca, Mg).
Dense, salty water — you float without effort.
Narutaki Onsen is located in Tokushima City, the capital of Tokushima Prefecture on Shikoku, where chloride-rich thermal waters provide mineral bathing within the urban landscape of the city famous for the Awa Odori—Japan's most exuberant traditional dance festival, held each August and drawing over a million spectators and dancers to the city's streets in an extraordinary display of communal cultural celebration. The sodium-chloride mineral composition of these onsen waters is valued in Japanese bathing culture for warming the body, conditioning the skin, and supporting the musculoskeletal recovery that is particularly welcome after participating in the physically demanding all-night dancing of the Awa Odori. Tokushima's position at the start of the 88-temple Shikoku pilgrimage—where Ryozenji Temple marks the beginning of the circuit that has drawn white-robed pilgrims in the footsteps of Kobo Daishi since the 10th century—gives Narutaki Onsen a location at the spiritual threshold of one of Japan's most enduring Buddhist walking traditions.