Private sauna in Japan.
How a ryokan sauna works

A sauna in Japan is not quite the sauna you know. There is a fixed shape to it, and once you know the shape, everything else makes sense.

The word people use for the feeling at the end is totonoi. It means something like being set right — the quiet that arrives after heat, cold and open air, in that order.

MATSUKAWAKAN is a hot-spring inn in Takayama Village, Nagano, with two saunas that can be booked privately. Below is how the Japanese cycle works, what is different here, and what it costs.

The cycle: heat, cold water, open air — three times round

The Japanese sauna is a loop rather than a room. Warm through, get into cold water, then sit outside in the air and do nothing. That is one round, and most people go round three times.

Our staff suggest starting in the onsen bath to warm up, then 10 to 12 minutes in the 110°C room. Pouring löyly — water on the hot stones — about two minutes before you leave wraps the heat around you.

Then the cold bath. Ours is 120 cm deep and filled with water from the mountains, so you can sink in to the shoulders. If that is too much, pouring it over your head and shoulders still works.

Then the open air, which is the part visitors most often skip and most regret skipping. Five to ten minutes in a chair, breathing, looking at the sky. The full order our staff recommend is set out on how to use the sauna.

What is different here: swimsuits, so you go in together

Public saunas in Japan are usually split by gender and used with nothing on. That single fact is what stops most couples, families and friends from going in together.

Both saunas at MATSUKAWAKAN are used wearing a swimsuit and a sauna poncho. Men and women go in together, and children come with a parent or guardian.

The bathing itself is separate from that. The onsen baths follow the ordinary Japanese custom — no swimsuit, and separate baths — while the saunas are the shared, clothed part of the day.

Two buildings: shared at 2,300 yen, or private from 9,800

There are two sauna buildings here and they answer different questions.

The Forest Sauna stands in the woods. It has two rooms, at 85°C and 110°C, the 120 cm cold bath, and an open-air resting space with three kinds of chair. Day use is 2,300 yen per person, in two-hour slots, up to 10 people per slot.

The Tenku Sauna is the private one: 1,000 metres above sea level, one group at a time, built in hinoki cypress with a HARVIA tower stove and radiant heat from stone. Prices are subject to change; please confirm on the booking site.

What to bring, and what you can rent

You can arrive with nothing and still have a full sauna. Everything is available on the day.

The poncho matters more than it sounds. In autumn and winter, sitting outside with one over your shoulders after 110°C is the best few minutes of the day.

Manners, in five lines

Japanese sauna etiquette is short, and none of it is difficult.

Wash yourself at the shower before you get into any bath or sauna. Drink water when you arrive and between rounds — a sauna takes more out of you than it feels like. Keep your voice down; the open-air rest is the quiet part.

Do not force the cold bath, and do not force a fourth round. Leave the resting chairs free when you have finished with them, so the next person can sit.

On tattoos: guests with tattoos are welcome in all of the baths at MATSUKAWAKAN. At the village's public bathhouses, please follow the notices posted on site.

Staying the night doubles how often you go in

A private sauna works perfectly well as a day trip. Staying simply gives you more of it.

Room plans include the Forest Sauna at no extra cost, and from 20:00 to 23:00 it belongs to overnight guests alone, with the fire lit outside. That gives you the sauna in the evening and again the next morning.

The bath hours change too: day visitors bathe from 11:00 to 20:00, overnight guests from 11:00 to 24:00. With check-in at 15:00 and check-out at 10:00, a night here is about 23 hours.

There is also a free shuttle from Nagano Station for overnight guests, by reservation, so nobody has to drive after the sauna. Day use and a stay are compared in figures on Sauna Stay.

Frequently asked questions