Arima onsen

We went to Arima today to visit an onsen(Japanese style hot spring).

This is a popular place to take a day trip since it is close to Osaka, Kobe, and Kyoto.

This place was tucked into the mountains with lots of cool plants around.

The sign at the door states that tattoos are prohibitted, but this doesn`t apply to foreigners I guess. I have never had a problem going into a hot spring with a medium size tattoo in the middle of my back. Someone explained this to me one time. This rule is to weed out Japanese gangsters. I guess it is obvious that I am not a Japanese gangster.

This is an old Japanese mail box.

We had a great day. It was a 45 minutes ride up into the mountains. Then we spent about three hours just hanging around the hot spring. All in all, it was a pretty relaxing day.