Happiness feeling

Searching for my happiness in an enveloping feeling

Yu-pon sometimes feels the joy of being in a warm and softly enveloping futon in the morning.

In the dim morning light, Yu-pon always thinks in bed: ‘Don’t ever let me go—my precious world is still going, please!’ This feeling might come from a primitive memory from before birth, don’t you think? Yu-pon believes that nobody can resist this, especially on winter mornings. This kind of sensation rarely occurs during a typical onsen bath.

This doesn’t usually happen during a regular bath or at just any onsen. In Yu-pon’s case, i it’s not an everyday thing, but sometimes happens during the second bath after taking a sauna and sweating a lot. If you visit an onsen at the right time and place for a truly blissful bathing experience, you will be filled with healing ecstasy.

My favorite onsen spots are Hana-yu no Mori (Flower Spring Forest) and Syakunage no Yu (Alpine Rose). Those facilities are a day trip onsen. Hana-yu no Mori is located in Fukaya City, just about an hour’s drive from Tokyo.

Kids under 12 aren’t allowed, so you can relax without any distractions. Syakunage no Yu is in Hikagenangou, a town by the Tone River. It’s pretty far—about a 2-hour drive from Tokyo.