Kannawa Onsen

Kannawa Onsen is one of the celebrated Beppu Hatto—the Eight Spring Zones of Beppu—in Oita Prefecture, Japan's thermal capital, and is famous above all others for its mukashi-mushi tradition: the use of volcanic steam, rather than liquid water, to cook food in bamboo steamers placed over the natural ground vents, creating a form of culinary geothermal cooking unique to Beppu's most volcanically active district. The sulfurous waters carry the volcanic intensity characteristic of Kannawa's position directly over one of the most thermally active geological zones in all of Japan, where the earth's thermal output is so high that it drives both healing springs and food preparation simultaneously. Bathing at Kannawa means participating in a hot spring culture that is simultaneously the most domestic and the most primally volcanic in the entire country.