Beppu Onsen — Japan's Hot Spring Capital

Beppu sits about 160 kilometers north of Miyazaki City in neighboring Oita Prefecture, reached by JR train with a connection at Oita Station in roughly 2.5 hours (¥4,500-5,000 one way), or by car via the expressway in about the same time. Beppu produces more hot-spring water than anywhere else in Japan, and the city's signature attraction is the Beppu Jigoku Meguri, a circuit of seven 'hells' — vividly colored hot springs unsuitable for bathing but striking to view, including the cobalt-blue Umi Jigoku, the boiling red Chinoike Jigoku, and Tatsumaki Jigoku's periodic geyser eruptions. The hells split across two clusters, Kannawa and Shibaseki, a short bus ride apart, and a combined ticket covers entry to all of them; walking between the hells within each cluster takes most of a morning or afternoon. Beyond sightseeing, Beppu's eight distinct hot-spring districts (the Beppu Hatto) offer public bathhouses for a soak, including sand baths at Beppu Kaihin Sand Bath, where visitors are buried up to the neck in naturally heated black sand facing the ocean. A practical itinerary starts with an early train from Miyazaki, a late-morning tour of the Kannawa hells, lunch in the Kannawa onsen district, an afternoon visit to the Shibaseki hells or a soak at a public bathhouse, and a sand bath before the return train. Winter mornings are especially atmospheric, when steam rises visibly off the streets and hells against cold air, though the hells and bathhouses operate year-round. Food in Beppu centers on jigoku-mushi, food steamed using the geothermal steam itself, available at several restaurants and market stalls near the Kannawa hell cluster, alongside standard izakaya fare near the train station.