Sekitei

Miyahama Onsen sits at the coastal edge of Hatsukaichi City in Hiroshima prefecture, separated from the island of Miyajima by only a narrow channel of the Seto Inland Sea. Miyajima — home to Itsukushima Shrine and its famous torii gate, which appears to float on the water at high tide — is one of Japan's most visited and most photographed landscapes. Sekitei occupies a position just removed from that intensity, in the quieter hot spring district that faces the island across the water.

The ryokan's design philosophy is organized around the garden. Where other properties use their outdoor spaces as backdrop or amenity, Sekitei treats the garden as the experience itself — a curated landscape that guests inhabit rather than simply observe. Detached-style rooms or buildings are distributed within this setting, each with its own relationship to the surrounding greenery and stone. The sense of privacy that results is unusual in a region that draws significant tourist traffic.

With only twelve rooms, the property operates at a scale that allows the kind of personalized attention that larger establishments cannot sustain. Natural onsen water from local springs feeds the baths, and kaiseki meals use ingredients from Hiroshima's exceptional seafood tradition and the agricultural produce of the Hiroshima and Yamaguchi regions. The Seto Inland Sea, visible from parts of the property, contributes both visual depth and culinary context.

For travelers who have arranged an itinerary around Hiroshima's Peace Memorial, the Itsukushima Shrine, and the gentle seascape of the Setouchi region, Sekitei provides a base that is neither a transit hotel nor a destination removed from context. It is instead a place where the landscape of the region can be absorbed slowly, over the course of an evening and a morning, without urgency.