Four-star One MICHELIN Key Yamashiro Onsen, Kaga, well outside Kanazawa, Kanazawa
Araya Totoan
A ryokan of seventeen rooms at Yamashiro Onsen, kept by the same family for eighteen generations, with cypress baths fed by its own spring and the works of Rosanjin on the walls.
Opens the hotel's own website. We have no arrangement with the hotel.
- MICHELIN
- One Key, 2026
- Rooms
- 17, each with a spring-fed bath
- Family
- Eighteen generations
- From the airport
- About 25 minutes by taxi from Komatsu
The hotel
Bath keepers to the Maeda lords.
The Araya family kept the baths of Yamashiro Onsen for the Maeda lords of Kaga, and the present head of the house is the eighteenth. The inn traces its beginnings back more than eight hundred years. Its spring rises from a few dozen metres down, about 100,000 litres a day, and won a gold medal at the International Hygiene Exhibition in Germany in 1911.
In the early Taisho years the fifteenth head took up a young artist named Kitaoji Rosanjin, buying his work while he was still unknown. Rosanjin spent a year at the inn and wrote the sign over the door. His calligraphy, paintings and early ceramics still hang here. The bar, Arisugawa Sanso, is an early Meiji wooden house built without a single nail.
- The public baths Rurikou smells of cypress, Gensenkaku is dark and full of steam, and Karasu-yu has a warm side and a hot side.
- Rosanjin His works fill the lobby, the gallery and the tea house, and more of it hangs in the Sukiya room.
- Kaga at the table Kaiseki with seafood from Hashidate port and Kaga vegetables, served on Kutani porcelain and Yamanaka lacquer. Snow crab is grilled over charcoal in winter.
Rooms & suites
Tatami, a terrace and a cypress bath.
Each of the seventeen rooms has a tatami sitting room, a bedroom with low beds, a terrace and a cypress bath on the spring. Eleven have an open-air bath.
- Japanese and Western Rooms with semi-open-air baths Tatami for sitting, beds for sleeping, and a bath half open to the air.
- Two-level bath Wakana A Yoshino cypress tub in two tiers, the water running from the upper to the lower.
- Historic Maeda-han Stateroom The room where Rosanjin lived during his stay.
Dining
Kaiseki in a private room.
As described by the inn and the MICHELIN Guide. No current MICHELIN restaurant guide covers Kaga. Shown for information.
- Kaiseki dinner Seasonal kaiseki In a private dining room or in your room
- Breakfast Japanese Served each morning
- Arisugawa Sanso Bar An early Meiji wooden house
Good to know
Before you go.
- Arrival Check-in from 2 pm to 7 pm, check-out at 11 am.
- Shuttle A free car meets guests at JR Kaga Onsen Station, about ten minutes away. Book it at least a day ahead.
- Diet Vegetarian and vegan menus on request; gluten-free is not always possible.
Getting there
Flying to Kanazawa.
Komatsu Airport, used by scheduled flights and by business jets arranged with a handler, is about twenty-five minutes away by taxi. From Kanazawa the drive takes about an hour, our estimate.
- Seoul 1 h 30
- Shanghai 2 h 20
- Taipei 2 h 50
- Hong Kong 3 h 50
- Singapore 7 h 05 long-range jet
Questions
What guests ask first.
- Does Araya Totoan have a MICHELIN Key?
- Yes, one Key in the MICHELIN Guide's 2026 selection for Japan.
- Is Araya Totoan in Kanazawa?
- No. It is at Yamashiro Onsen in the city of Kaga, about an hour's drive south-west of Kanazawa by our estimate, and about twenty-five minutes from Komatsu Airport.
- What links Araya Totoan to Rosanjin?
- The artist Kitaoji Rosanjin spent a year at the inn in the early twentieth century, supported by the fifteenth head of the family. His calligraphy, paintings and ceramics are still on show.
- Can SkyCourtage arrange the flight to Kanazawa?
- Yes. We arrange Business and First Class seats on scheduled airlines and private jet charter to Kanazawa, with one final price, our margin included. The hotel is booked with the hotel or through our booking partner.
Also in Kanazawa
Other hotels worth the trip.
- Tsuruko Four rooms with their own living rooms and open-air baths, about five minutes from Kanazawa Station, new to the MICHELIN Keys in 2026.
- Beniya Mukayu Sixteen rooms in modernist buildings, every one with a private outdoor hot-spring bath.
- Hitotsu Notojima Eight rooms on the island of Notojima, each with tall windows on the water, and sushi made from the local catch.
Staying at Araya Totoan?
Book the room, then the flight.
Rates and availability come from the hotel itself. For the journey to Kanazawa, a Business or First Class seat or an aircraft of your own: tell us the date and we come back with one final price, our margin included.
Opens the hotel's own website. We have no arrangement with the hotel.