KAI Miyajima

KAI Miyajima is a 54-room ryokan (a traditional Japanese inn where guests dine and sleep) that opened on 23 July 2026 at Miyajimaguchi, on the shore of the Seto Inland Sea, directly opposite Miyajima island and its Itsukushima Shrine. Every room looks out to the island. It belongs to KAI, the ryokan brand of the Japanese group Hoshino Resorts. It suits couples or families who want to see Miyajima while sleeping on the opposite shore: you cross by boat from the pier next door and come back to the top-floor onsen.

A ryokan facing the island

The house is lived in barefoot: the whole interior is laid with tatami (rice-straw mats). The room decor, called Umigiri (sea fog), picks up the blues of the Inland Sea: gradient curtains, Fukuyama denim cushions and a long sofa beneath the window for looking at the island.

Every evening the inn offers a free shirabyōshi dance from the Heian period (794-1185), with the story of Itsukushima Shrine, founded according to tradition in 593, whose present buildings over the sea date from 1168.

Choosing a room

All five types have low beds, 200 × 95 cm except in the suites, and a view of Miyajima. The room table gives sizes, including the terrace for rooms with an outdoor bath; to choose:

• The top-floor onsen is enough: the TA3 (53 to 64 m², three beds), with shower and separate toilet, the simplest.
• A hot spring bath of your own, facing the shrine: the RA3 (57 m², three beds) has its open-air bath on the terrace; a gradient plaster wall evokes sea mist. The RA4 (67 m², four beds), on a corner, does the same for a family of four.
• A group of six: the FA6 (109 m²), a corner suite with a large living area and two bedrooms, without a private bath.
• Honeymoon or anniversary: the four RC2 suites (99 m²), on the corners, have two 200 × 120 cm beds, a large living area with wide windows and a secluded open-air bath, with a sofa on the terrace.

Two rooms accept medium-sized dogs; these stays with a dog are booked from within Japan.

The baths and the stone sauna

The water comes from the Miyajimaguchi Onsen spring, a weakly radioactive sodium chloride water, heated. On the top floor, the open-air bath is designed to seem to run into the sea, facing the island; the indoor baths, one hot and one lukewarm, filled with free-flowing spring water, face the mountains. A rest lounge with a terrace adjoins the baths. The etiquette is in our onsen etiquette guide.

The inn also has an ishiburo, the traditional stone sauna of the Inland Sea, at about 50 °C, by reservation and for guests aged 12 and over.

Dining

Dinner, the Aki no Kaiyu Kaiseki (kaiseki being a Japanese meal of many small seasonal courses), is served at 5.30 pm or 7.30 pm, in semi-private rooms or at a counter facing Miyajima. A vegetarian menu is prepared on request five days ahead. Breakfast is served from 7 to 9 am. Check-in is at 2.30 pm, check-out at 11 am.

Miyajima from the hotel

A boat leaves the pier next to the hotel for Miyajima, by reservation; the other way, allow about 20 minutes from the island's ferry terminal. You can also take the public ferry from Miyajimaguchi, a crossing of about 10 minutes with a departure roughly every 15 minutes, for 200 ¥ (about 2 €); Hatsukaichi city adds a visitor tax of 100 ¥ (about 1 €) per person, collected with the boat ticket.

On the island, the shrine opens at 6.30 am and closes between 5 and 6 pm depending on the season; staying next door makes it easy to be there at opening time. The Miyajima Ropeway climbs towards Mount Misen. In the evening, a 30-minute cruise passes the illuminated shrine and great torii (sacred gateway). Hiroshima, with its Peace Memorial Museum and the Atomic Bomb Dome, is about 25 minutes from Miyajimaguchi by JR (Japan Railways) train. It is all on our Hiroshima and Miyajima page.

Getting there

The hotel is at 1-1-6 Miyajimaguchinishi, Hatsukaichi, 4 minutes by car from JR Miyajimaguchi Station and 12 minutes on foot from JR Maezora Station. Hiroshima is about 4 hours from Tokyo and 1 hour 30 from Osaka by Shinkansen (bullet train). Trains and passes are explained in our Japan trains and JR Pass guide.

KAI Miyajima or Iwaso

Our selection has two ryokan for Miyajima. Iwaso, founded in 1854, is on the island itself, in the Momijidani valley 300 m from the shrine, with wooden cottages from the 1920s to the 1950s and a shared onsen; it is the address for walking the island in the evening and at dawn. KAI Miyajima is on the opposite shore, new, with 54 rooms all facing the island, a top-floor onsen, rooms with a private open-air bath and rooms for six; it is the address for looking at the island and reaching it by boat.