Gora Hotel Paipu no Kemuri — Hotel in Hakone

This hotel actually exceeded our expectations! When I booked, I had doubts as I thought it would be a little run down but it is actually a nice property in an amazing location. The décor is a little dated but it is kind of the style of the hotel.||I booked through Rakuten Travel website and upon arrival our reservation was all in order. I would recommend including the breakfast option as there is little in the way of cafes open before 10am in the Gora area.||Our twin room was a little bigger than the ones in major cities. It was clean and the linen changed daily. The room includes tea making facilities, a small fridge and there is sufficient space to lay luggage (on the floor). ||The hotel provides (male/female separated) onsen areas with an indoor and outdoor pool in each. It was great to use this at the end of the day of sightseeing, particularly when temperatures where cold. The breakfast buffet caters more to the local market but did provide bacon, scrambled eggs, toast with jam, croissants, tinned fruit and yoghurt, coffee as well as salads, soups, fish etc. I found it was sufficient to cater for Western needs.||The location is perfect and so easy to access the local transport including the various train/ropeway/ferry around Lake Ashi and a direct bus to Gotemba Premium Outlets. ||The location is also good to walk to restaurants in the town for dinner. There are a wide variety of restaurants with varying degrees of costs (some...

Literally right across from Gora train station, a 2-min walk. Most courteous staff, limited English but they do try. Super clean.||This is one of the very few western style hotel in the area that doesn't require you to book with a meal package. However, breakfast (at 540 yen) and dinner (1080 yen) could be added with prior notice. Breakfast, buffet style, mostly Japanese food, does have a small selection of western items (scrambled egg, toast, croissant, milk, yogurt, coffe/tea, fruit).||Twin room, at 18 sq m (195 sq ft) is pretty comfortable and comes with 2 chairs and a coffee table beside a desk. The hotel does have a communal Japanese onsen bath which is probably more comfortable in taking a shower and a dip than cleaning in your bathroom (standard, prefabricated, cramped).||Being next to the train station, the western side of the hotel is right by the tracks and will suffer from some noise (trains run from 5 am to a little past midnight) but I found it negligible although some may want ear plugs. The hotel, overall, is very quiet.|Within 15 minutes walk you have access to about a dozen eateries. But most of them do close early at around 7 pm.||Of note is that price at their souvenir shop is very competitive. Some items are far cheaper than what you pay at the stores near...

We stayed here for 2 nights with our son. The room was clean and large compared to other hotels. The bathroom was a bit small. The room was located next to the train tracks but the noise didn't bother and our son liked to watch the trains passing by.||||The breakfast and dinner was ok. it was buffet style with enough choice.||||The hotel is easily located within walking distance from the Gora train station and cable car. It took less than 2 minutes walking. The hotel does not have English signs at the front but if you're prepared you can find it easily.||||The only problem is the lack of English speaking staff at the front desk. We tried to send our bag to the next hotel with Yamato but because the staff didn't speak Engish it was not possible to do. Before arrival we confirmed with Yamato if it was possible to do it and they did confirmed it. We ended up with taking our bag on the train and shipped it from...