Katayamazu Onsen片山津温泉

A glass-walled public bath on the edge of Lake Shibayama, designed by Taniguchi Yoshio (谷口吉生), the architect of the 2004 rebuild of New York's Museum of Modern Art. It opened on 21 April 2012. There are two baths: Kata-no-yu (潟の湯), where the water seems to run on into the lake, and Mori-no-yu (森の湯), facing a green courtyard. They swap between men and women by date: on odd days women have the lake bath, on even days men do.

The source is the town's No. 2 spring: 72°C, about 400 litres a minute, a salty sodium calcium chloride water (pH 6.6). The café upstairs (closed Thursdays) looks over the lake, and the ground-floor shop sells eggs boiled in the spring water at ¥90 each. Closed all day on 15 October 2026 for maintenance.

A small floating hall reached by a pier from Yu-no-moto Park. It enshrines the dragon king of the town's founding legend and Benzaiten, and locals call it Uki-uki Benten. It is lit at night. The lake is said to change colour up to seven times with the weather, and on a clear day the Hakusan range stands behind it, snow-capped in winter.

The free Engawa foot bath in nearby Sunahase Park (5:00–24:00) runs on undiluted spring water.

Built by Kaga city in the birthplace of Nakaya Ukichirō (1900–1962), the physicist who made the first artificial snow crystals and wrote that snow is a letter sent from heaven. The building is by Isozaki Arata. Experiments show diamond dust and supercooled water, and you can make an ice pendant. It reopened on 4 April 2026 after a year closed for repairs to damage from the 2024 Noto earthquake. The fog effect in the courtyard sculpture has been paused since September 2026; the courtyard itself is open.

In 2026 the fireworks ran every night from 1 to 30 August, at about 21:00 for ten minutes, over the lake. Watching from the shore is free. The pier to Ukimi-dō costs ¥300, and guests at Katayamazu inns get a free ticket at the front desk. Rain cancels them. The 2027 dates are not yet out; the festival normally runs from early to late August. Lanterns go onto the lake on 16 August (¥900 each, booked through the Aizen-ji temple).