Kurokawa Onsen’s Nyuto Tegata Bathing Pass Is Redesigned: 50,000 on Sale from 1 July

Nyuto Tegata, one adult passJPY 1,500incl. taxThree baths of your choice from 25 ryokan / valid six months from purchase

Issued by

Kurokawa Onsen Ryokan Cooperative, Minamioguni, Kumamoto

Sale period

2026-07-01 – 2027-03-31

Number issued

50,000, and sales end once they are gone

Where to buy

Any Kurokawa Onsen ryokan, or the cooperative’s office, Kaze no Ya

Bathing hours

8:30 to 21:00

Children’s pass

JPY 700, ages 3 to the end of primary school

Checked on

2026-09-14

The Kurokawa Onsen Ryokan Cooperative announced on 28 June 2026 that the Nyuto Tegata, the bathing pass the town is known for, turns 40, and put out a commemorative edition. The 40th-anniversary design is on sale from 1 July 2026 to the end of March 2027, limited to 50,000, at the unchanged JPY 1,500 for an adult.

JPY 1,500 for three open-air baths, and 50,000 passes in the anniversary design

One pass admits you to any three open-air baths among the 25 ryokan in Kurokawa Onsen. Three stickers sit on the back: two red ones for baths, one green that can go towards food, drink or a souvenir instead. The pass is valid for six months from the day you buy it, so anything left over from one stay carries into a return visit inside that window. Bathing runs from 8:30 to 21:00. One pass covers one person and cannot be shared with whoever you came with.

The Nyuto Tegata dates from 1986. It was built to carry two inns that had no room for an open-air bath of their own, on the principle that the town earns together rather than one house at a time. In the anniversary design, the old man who has been sitting in the bath in the illustration for 40 years climbs out and leaves the frame. The space he vacates is filled by collecting “old man mark” stamps placed around the town, and finding the rarer marks hidden somewhere in the streets — the post-bath beauty and the fresh-from-the-bath old man — changes the picture again.

The passes are cut from thinned cedar and cypress out of the Oguni district, and local groups including the seniors’ association take part in making them. One per cent of sales goes to the townscape and to conserving the surrounding environment. The children’s pass is JPY 700 and covers ages three to the last year of primary school; bathe in three baths, collect the stamps and hand the pass in at the cooperative, and the child gets a toy or sweets.

Photography is not allowed in the open-air baths as a rule. Some baths are closed for cleaning or because the inn is shut for the day, which makes an itinerary built on three specific baths a poor bet — pick the town first and the baths on the day. The summer Yusuzumi evenings ran from 18 July to 22 August 2026, with paper and stone lanterns lighting the street, food trucks as Yusuzumi Yokocho every Saturday and a closing festival on the last day; all of that is now over.

When does the next airfare sale come? Six weeks of records and what is bookable now →

Source: Kurokawa Onsen official site, Nyuto Tegata page / Kurokawa Onsen Ryokan Cooperative announcement, 28 June 2026 / Photo: tjabeljan, CC BY 2.0 (Wikimedia Commons) / Checked on 2026-09-14