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Shikotsu-Tōya NP., Hokkaido
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This 450-m-wide, 11-hectare explosion crater releases about 10,000 tonnes of hot-spring water each day—enough to supply the inns of Noboribetsu Onsen below.
The crater floor has 15 named “hells,” including Blood Pond, Tiger, Cannon and Maiden. These colorful names mark the geothermal vents and pools that helped inspire the valley’s name.
Noboribetsu is famed for 9 different spring qualities, including sulfur, alum and iron. Many of the area’s hot springs emerge at Jigokudani, its largest spring-source zone.
Launched in 2015, Noboribetsu’s Enma Yakisoba must follow 3 “rules”: Hokkaido-wheat flat noodles, sesame-rich spicy sauce and local ingredients. It passed 700,000 servings by March 2026.
Some Jigokudani springs form when volcanic gas heats mountain-stream water. The springs then flow downhill toward town by gravity, without extraction pumps pulling the water to the inns.
A 7-m-deep tank lets volcanic ash and mineral deposits settle before water reaches town. Its filter is woven bamboo: metal mesh corrodes in the spring water, and the supply manager says only one Asahikawa craftsperson still makes it.
The Ainu-derived name Noboribetsu refers to a river: nupur-pet means “deep-colored river,” linked to milky hot-spring runoff. Ainu people are also believed to have valued these springs as medicinal baths.
When explorer Takeshiro Matsuura visited in 1845, there was no proper road to the springs. He spread straw mats in the hot-spring river to bathe; by his 1858 return, a roofed bathing spot had appeared.
In 1857, sulfur miner and Ōmi merchant Hanbei Okada paid to build a bath shelter for workers at Jigokudani. The workers’ bathing place came a year before Kinzo Takimoto opened Noboribetsu’s first inn.
A small Kannon statue at the viewpoint is attributed to the monk Enku and dated to 1666. Local history says it disappeared in a 1911 forest fire, was later found, and now rests in a shrine overlooking the valley.
Tessen-ike, in the valley’s center, is a small geyser. Local guides note that it no longer erupts as vigorously as it once did; the steaming hot-spring stream along the boardwalk still reveals the source beneath your feet.
A local story links the Yakushi Hall near the valley entrance to a sulfur miner’s recovery: a Nambu retainer reportedly washed an eye ailment in the spring and got better. A stone was donated in gratitude in 1861.
Local folklore says Yukijin demons guard the valley’s medicinal springs. The hand-held demon fireworks are a much newer tradition: they began in 2006 to enliven quiet summer nights before the August Jigoku Festival.
Near the volcanic basin, Noboribetsu Primeval Forest became a National Natural Monument in 1924. The Forestry Agency records about 60 tree species and 110 herbaceous plant species in this protected woodland.
