About Beitou and the Hot Springs Museum
Beitou is where Taipei takes its tired shoulders. The district's symbol is the old public bathhouse, opened in 1913 during Japanese rule and modeled on a bathhouse in the Izu region of Japan. At the time, it was the largest bathhouse in East Asia.
After World War II, the building was abandoned. In 1994, teachers and students from a local primary school came across it on a study trip and asked for it to be preserved; in 1997 it became a municipal historic site and, in 1998, reopened as a museum. Xinbeitou metro station is less than 500 meters away.
