Lake Shikotsu Tsuruga Besso Ao no Za — Hotel in Chitose

Our family stayed at this hotel for 2 nights. While my other family members are completely satisfied and happy, I left with mixed feelings. But this is a special experience which I think is worthy of my time to share a detailed review here.||We stayed at the suite resort and suite sky resort (1 night each). The design and maintenance of the hotel are impressive. It is a place that feels artistic, escaping from the busy life to fully relax and enjoy a good view of the lake. All guests need to take off shoes while in the hotel, and can wear the hotel wear (Japanese style) while doing different activities in the hotel (feel truly immersed in the atmosphere).||Most staff are very smart, proactive, and attentive to client needs. They generally speak good English, although some cannot but they will still try their best to help. We tried both the Japanese tea ceremony and indigo, and those were very good (but these activities are not suitable for very young kids like aged below 6). The staff are real professionals.||The rooms are ready early so after we arrive around 1pm (which is impressive because most hotels will just hold the room until the check-in time even though the room is available). We were led by the staff into the room and were given a brief introduction, and our luggage was carried by the staff.||We stayed in a different room type on the second day, and could wait in the room until the new room is available at around 11:30am (again, this is very considerate action by the hotel). On the first day, we got champagne, welcome chocolate and fruit. On the second day, we got afternoon tea service at room (desserts which were very nice).||Room size is large (100m2 or larger), and with the room service, it is enjoyable to just stay and enjoy fully the hotel room. The in-room dining area turns into sleeping area for kids at night (staff set up futons while we had dinner). The beds and futons were comfortable. The in-room jacuzzi and open air both (onsen) are great - the temperature of the onsen water can be adjusted by calling the front desk (we didn't adjust though, as it was just fine).||The room service items are great - the kids like the Aonoza wraps a lot and the nuts in the platter have very special tasty smoky favor. Again, desserts were so good (they called it "original sweets", which they offer the strawberry tart and chestnut mousse for both days we stayed). The waiting time between calling and food arriving is acceptable (like 10 minutes in most cases, even in late evening). I didn't try their bar lounge though, because bar lounge doesn't accept kids.||Location wise, it is close to the Lake Shikotsu by 10-15 minutes walk. Quite convenient to go there (and enjoy the Ice Festival) - we go back and forth a few times without problem. The hotel can also lend child ski boat, which the kids love.||On the other hand, the meals are disappointing. We informed the hotel a couple weeks in advance that 1 kid is allergic to seafood and 2 kids cannot eat raw food (but can eat seafood). Here is what we got in the kid meals:||- First breakfast: The salted salmon in 1 of the kid meals is replaced with just another piece of egg (i.e. that kid get 2 tamagoyaki instead of 1). I expect something better than just another piece of egg. The other 2 kids still get cooked seafood (which is good).||- Second dinner: The 3 kids all just got a minced pork meat ball and some white soup stuff (no beef or seafood). This is quite disappointing given the high price for the kid meals.||- Second breakfast: For the main meal, all 3 kids just get an omelet, a sausage, a piece of potato and a cup of salad with cheese (see photo). I expected much more from this hotel (by the way we had meals at Kani Honke and Uni Murakami which we had some idea or expectation of what a meal should look like at a given price..), although kids didn't care much.||Pre-arrival email responses were slow, which could take days to get a reply in some cases (not an issue to me, but I was wondering whether I might be able to reserve the Teppan-yaki if I called instead of emailed). Having said that, the email responses were good that directly addressed all my questions (and even acknowledged a mistake I pointed out about the activity time in their website - the tea ceremony time starts actually at 14:00).||Although we stayed for 2 nights, we couldn't enjoy Teppan-yaki (we were in the waiting list, and I told the staff I am flexible in terms of timing).||While the open air onsen are great, I was able to see the cars on the street through the gaps between the opaque glass in the fences of the balcony (see photo; I tried from the street that it is possible to look into the onsen area through the gaps). For suite sky resort, there is a large sofa bed between the onsen and the fences so this is not an issue (perhaps this is not a big issue for other rooms because the gaps are very thin actually).||The suite sky resort has windows that can look into the sky - we enjoyed very much having meals in the balcony and looking at the street and sky through the large windows. However, for the part of the open air onsen, the window looking into the sky is covered by snow (see photo) so I cannot see the sky while enjoying the onsen.||The rooms are quite clean, but the cleaning seems not thorough. For the room on our second day, there are nails of the previous guest in the nail clipper box (see photo), and the water of the onsen seems not as clean.||Finally, this review is based on my very high expectation - if the room rate were not that high, this hotel would probably have scored a 5-star...

Our family stayed at this hotel for 2 nights. While my other family members are completely satisfied and happy, I left with mixed feelings. But this is a special experience which I think is worthy of my time to share a detailed review here.||We stayed at the suite resort and suite sky resort (1 night each). The design and maintenance of the hotel are impressive. It is a place that feels artistic, escaping from the busy life to fully relax and enjoy a good view of the lake. All guests need to take off shoes while in the hotel, and can wear the hotel wear (Japanese style) while doing different activities in the hotel (feel truly immersed in the atmosphere).||Most staff are very smart, proactive, and attentive to client needs. They generally speak good English, although some cannot but they will still try their best to help. We tried both the Japanese tea ceremony and indigo, and those were very good (but these activities are not suitable for very young kids like aged below 6). The staff are real professionals.||The rooms are ready early so after we arrive around 1pm (which is impressive because most hotels will just hold the room until the check-in time even though the room is available). We were led by the staff into the room and were given a brief introduction, and our luggage was carried by the staff.||We stayed in a different room type on the second day, and could wait in the room until the new room is available at around 11:30am (again, this is very considerate action by the hotel). On the first day, we got champagne, welcome chocolate and fruit. On the second day, we got afternoon tea service at room (desserts which were very nice).||Room size is large (100m2 or larger), and with the room service, it is enjoyable to just stay and enjoy fully the hotel room. The in-room dining area turns into sleeping area for kids at night (staff set up futons while we had dinner). The beds and futons were comfortable. The in-room jacuzzi and open air both (onsen) are great - the temperature of the onsen water can be adjusted by calling the front desk (we didn't adjust though, as it was just fine).||The room service items are great - the kids like the Aonoza wraps a lot and the nuts in the platter have very special tasty smoky favor. Again, desserts were so good (they called it "original sweets", which they offer the strawberry tart and chestnut mousse for both days we stayed). The waiting time between calling and food arriving is acceptable (like 10 minutes in most cases, even in late evening). I didn't try their bar lounge though, because bar lounge doesn't accept kids.||Location wise, it is close to the Lake Shikotsu by 10-15 minutes walk. Quite convenient to go there (and enjoy the Ice Festival) - we go back and forth a few times without problem. The hotel can also lend child ski boat, which the kids love.||On the other hand, the meals are disappointing. We informed the hotel a couple weeks in advance that 1 kid is allergic to seafood and 2 kids cannot eat raw food (but can eat seafood). Here is what we got in the kid meals:||- First breakfast: The salted salmon in 1 of the kid meals is replaced with just another piece of egg (i.e. that kid get 2 tamagoyaki instead of 1). I expect something better than just another piece of egg. The other 2 kids still get cooked seafood (which is good).||- Second dinner: The 3 kids all just got a minced pork meat ball and some white soup stuff (no beef or seafood). This is quite disappointing given the high price for the kid meals.||- Second breakfast: For the main meal, all 3 kids just get an omelet, a sausage, a piece of potato and a cup of salad with cheese (see photo). I expected much more from this hotel (by the way we had meals at Kani Honke and Uni Murakami which we had some idea or expectation of what a meal should look like at a given price..), although kids didn't care much.||Pre-arrival email responses were slow, which could take days to get a reply in some cases (not an issue to me, but I was wondering whether I might be able to reserve the Teppan-yaki if I called instead of emailed). Having said that, the email responses were good that directly addressed all my questions (and even acknowledged a mistake I pointed out about the activity time in their website - the tea ceremony time starts actually at 14:00).||Although we stayed for 2 nights, we couldn't enjoy Teppan-yaki (we were in the waiting list, and I told the staff I am flexible in terms of timing).||While the open air onsen are great, I was able to see the cars on the street through the gaps between the opaque glass in the fences of the balcony (see photo; I tried from the street that it is possible to look into the onsen area through the gaps). For suite sky resort, there is a large sofa bed between the onsen and the fences so this is not an issue (perhaps this is not a big issue for other rooms because the gaps are very thin actually).||The suite sky resort has windows that can look into the sky - we enjoyed very much having meals in the balcony and looking at the street and sky through the large windows. However, for the part of the open air onsen, the window looking into the sky is covered by snow (see photo) so I cannot see the sky while enjoying the onsen.||The rooms are quite clean, but the cleaning seems not thorough. For the room on our second day, there are nails of the previous guest in the nail clipper box (see photo), and the water of the onsen seems not as clean.||Finally, this review is based on my very high expectation - if the room rate were not that high, this hotel would probably have scored a 5-star...

I made a reservation for 2 nights through Relux, in which I had mentioned our food allergies, and that the 2nd day of our stay would be my partner's birthday. The hotel emailed me and attended to our food allergies. Although they didn't mention a word about my partner's birthday, I thought it was okay and I thanked them for treating our food allergies with care.

Upon arrival, the staff attended to us and again confirmed the food allergy details.

At the start of our dinner during 1st day, they once again checked with us about our food allergies.

With all the care in advance and confirmation, they still served the ingredient that my partner was allergic to in the dinner on the 2nd day, which exactly was my partner's birthday.

So, they served us allergic food even after 3 times of acknowledgments; moreover, there was nothing for my partner's birthday, only allergic food.

This time, we stayed in 5 different hotels within 2 weeks in Japan, some of the not too expensive ones surprised us with birthday services even without us mentioning anything (they knew by checking our passports), and those days were not exactly our birthdays.

We wanted to try their dying activity but the staff informed us that the dyes were either too old or not yet ready. They had 4 pots of dyes so I wasn't sure why as I thought they could have 4 dyes with different "ages" to avoid this kind of timing issue.

The hardware was good, the staff was nice and attentive. Yet I was so disappointed with all these arrangements. Especially with around JPY170,000 per night, it didn't meet the standard at all.

However, I would like to thank a male staff, he was so nice, apologized about the dyes, and let us check and take photos of the dying room. He even helped us locate all the historical and art pieces scattered around the dining area outside of dining time (the area was...