One of my ever top 3 things to do in Japan was spending the night in Ine, one of the most beautiful villages in Japan. Here is everything you need to know about Kyoto by the sea!
Ine is a rural fishing village in Norhern Kyoto that is often compared to Venice in Italy. It remains one of my favorite places off the beaten path that I have visited to date. The official name of this seaside town is Ine no funaya – funaya being traditional wooden boathouses that the village is made of, about 230 boat houses in total. If there is one thing I need to recommend to you, it is to stay in one of their funaya overnight. It was the most magical experience and I cannot imagine experiencing the beauty of Ine any other way.
How to get to Ine
Ine is roughly 3.5hrs away from Kyoto City, making it not suitable for a day trip at all in my opinion. While it can be done, and many tours are offering as much, it goes completely against the experience of Ine and you will not be able to truly enjoy this special place as it should be. The charm of Ine lies in its slowness, the glistening ocean in front of the boat houses, meeting the locals and enjoying the scenery. Yes, you can visit Ine for a few hours, but you won’t be able to experience it.
You can take the Hashidate Limited Express from Kyoto Station directly to Amanohashidate and then transfer to the local bus which takes an hour from Amanohashidate Station to Ine. Make sure to check the schedule online as the bus only runs once an hour on average. There is only one bus going so you can’t really take the wrong one. I recommend to queue about 10-15mins before the bus arrival to get a seat, as the bus gets crowded and hot, especially during the summer months (the best time to visit Ine!)
In my case, I always try to make the way there an experience too so instead of taking the direct express, I decided to take the retro breakfast train Kyoto Tango Kuro-Matsu from Fukuchiyama to Amanohashidate.
Taking the Kyoto Tango Kuro-Matsu breakfast train
You know I love a good scenic train journey so when I found out about this scenic breakfast train I knew I just had to take it! This retro-style train travels Fridays – Sundays past mountain roads and countrysides while you are served a locally produced breakfast. This was one of my favorite experiences to really get into the mood of slow travel and spend a relaxed weekend in Northern Kyoto by the sea. The breakfast was absolutely delicious while enjoying the beautiul views and stopping at rural stations along the way. You can book the breakfast course directly through their website. I recommend to book this early as it tends to book out a lot. When we arrived in Amanohashidate, we took the bus to Ine, which takes a good hour.
What to see and do in Ine
For being such a small seaside town, I was surprised that there is actually quite a lot that you can do. It is by no means an action-filled place, but there quite a few activities that you can do. From the tourism center at Ine Bay, you can rent bicycles for free or, what we did, rent electric kickboards. Ine is actually quite vast and walking through the whole village from one end to the other would take 1-2 hours by foot. Getting around the village with the kickboards was a lot of fun and allowed us to save time while we had the flexibility to stop wherever we pleased.
Since Ine is a small village, most businesses are open from 9/10am to max. 4pm. There is a small shop close to the tourism center where you can buy drinks and snacks such as instant ramen. Make sure to plan accordingly so you don’t go hungry. We had a little stop at the Teahouse Chinzao which has a cute little terrace where we took a break and just enjoyed the views and great Taiwanese tea.
One thing you absolutely must do is rent a sea taxi and explore Ine from the sea. While the streets are really cute, the best view of Ine is actually from the sea. There is a big sightseeing boat available that I personally would not recommend – it is crowded, expensive and it can’t get as close to the village as the smaller boats. Going with a smaller boat means you can get a personalized tour with lots of background info (in Japanese, but our guide actually also had a little handmade book with notes in English which we found super thoughtful if you don’t speak Japanese) and actually get close and personal with the villages. We learned a lot and our guide also gave us esa, food to feed the sea gulls from the boat which was great fun. If you stay in a funaya you can also arrange to be picked up directly from your houseboat – how cool is that??
Staying overnight in a funaya
My absolute favorite part of this whole trip was to stay overnight in a renovated traditional houseboat. I was actually sad that I did not book 2 nights so that we could enjoy the houseboat to its fullest! We stayed at Ine Miyabi (find the Google Maps location here) that we booked via Jalan and I cannot recommend this funaya enough. It is spacious, modern yet traditional, with an absolute beautiful terrace with direct access to the water and even including a hot spring to bath in. We thoroughly enjoyed our stay here so much! There is no breakfast included so I highly recommend to make a reservation for the Japanese or Western style breakfast here at Funaya Kajiya (need to make a reservation at least the day before for the breakfast service). It was incredible! We were the only customers that day and they took great care of us.
At night, we both took a bath in the hot spring and had dinner that we bought beforehand at one of the local restaurants. While we were sitting on our terrace and watched the ocean in the dark, we noticed a shimmering blue light that seemed to glow in the dark… turns out that you can see bioluminescence in the Bay of Ine?! We were both not aware of this and some googling revealed that it is indeed quite rare, but happens occasionally from May-June. It was a magical experience and I wish I could have captured it but it was too subtle as the bioluminescence is activated by movement and there was not a lof of movemen in the water. It will be our little core memory living on inside our hearts. The only thing I would do differently is to book two nights next time.
I was really grateful to be able to spend such a relaxed time with my best friend in such a beautiful place in Japan. Will you stay in Ine next time you go to Japan?