S P O T ／ SPOT-295

Nishi-no-Kawara Park (Sai-no-Kawara)

西の河原公園（賽の河原）さいのかわらこうえん

At the western edge of Kusatsu Onsen, hot spring water wells up not from a single source but from across an entire riverbed — about 1,400 liters a minute, some of it acidic enough (around pH 1.5) to rank among the most corrosive natural waters in Japan. That acidity kills almost all plant life, leaving a bleached, steaming wasteland of pale rock that early visitors compared to the Sai-no-Kawara, the Buddhist limbo where dead children pile stones beside the river of the underworld. The place was once called Oni no Senzui, the demon's spring waters, and legend held that shouting here would summon demons. A 15-minute walk from the Yubatake, the park is free to enter and contains one of Japan's largest open-air baths; at night it glows under lighting by the same designer who lit the Yubatake. It is a hot-spring hell made literal — where the blessing of the waters and a landscape that refuses life occupy the same ground.