Gora Kansuirou — Hotel in Hakone

Here's the proper review specifically for the Gora Kansuirou Japanese Room with Private Hot Spring Bath, Kasei, 1F:

This review is to help the customer find out if they really want to pay their price, and to help the hotel make it worth the stay for the price they are charging.

I would not stay anywhere else, however, they have to offer a better upkeep to the property, for the price being charged.

In short, very expensive just because of the lack of care of the room and general appearance of the hotel. However, the property and experience is like no other in the area, and the food is much better than you could get in a Michellin rated restaurant.

VIEWS ARE SPECTACULAR. You can't get a better view inside a hotel property, anywhere else in Gora. The property is big, the Garden is probably almost as big, and prettier than Gora Park, really special. Again, NOWHERE ELSE IN GORA YOU WILL FIND SUCH AN AMAZING PROPERTY, VIEWS, SECLUSION AND PRIVACY.

HOT BATHS / ONSEN: The outdoor bath is great, however one of the indoors (the one that in the evening is set for Men only) is not too charming. Needs restoration... it looks too dark, and although very clean, it looks dirty.

ROOM: The room itself is small. Pictures available in Expedia makes the room look huge. NO, it is very small, definitely not for more than 2 persons (at least the room we got). Not a bad size for a ryokan, but I would say not more than 2 people should stay here. I don't mind the old looks of the room. It keeps the old Japanese house style alive and I really like that, that is WHAT I WANTED. HOWEVER, the room is not kept well. Spider webs, dust, smashed bugs that were never cleaned off the walls, dark spots due to constant use and touch in certain areas on the doors, walls and cabinets due to lack of cleaning, which could be easily cleaned by the staff, some areas on the walls that have been just scratched, have been that way for too long. The 5x2.5 feet carpet area also needs a new carpet. It is old, dirty and spotty. Overall, the rooms need a VERY GOOD SPOT CLEANING or PAINT, and better up keeping, especially for the price they are charging. The hotel also needs some maintenance/paint, just to look clean. Don't get me wrong, everything is very clean, but it just looks dirty and not kept well, it is just the looks of it.

FOOD IS SECOND TO NONE. Beautiful, delicious, fantastic. You won't find anything more special anywhere else in Hakone for sure! There are simply no words to review the food. It is really good, with amazing presentation. They are super accommodating to people allergic to certain foods as well. Kudos to the chef!!!

Fantastic Ryokan experience, but the upkeeping of the rooms specially, can't keep up for the price they charged. There are just a few rooms in this hotel, so they should be able to keep up. If they take care of it, this will FOR SURE BE WORTH THE CHARGE! I do recommend this place, but I also recommend that this place gets a little...

(edit: I stayed in may of 2023, things may have changed since)

I'd like to say the Josians review of the hotel is very accurate. I stayed in the exact same room as him. Here are my personal thoughts:

The ryokan is exactly what I wanted, old style traditional Japanese Ryokan. Between the layout of the room and the hotel grounds you'll agree that it feels very traditional. The garden, although it could use some care, is gorgeous, there's even koi fish in the little water way.

The staff are LOVELY. The servers in the dinning room are all kind, cute, friendly and funny. The tall man who greats you is SO SWEET and kind.

Although I wasn't a fan of the dinner the first night, the seconds night dinner was delicious and the breakfast were both yummy! (Keep in mind, I requested no seafood. The replaced a lot of the seafood with bamboo shoots and sometimes duck)

With all this being said, if you are finicky about bugs I would stay clear of this place. The building is old and surrounded by its garden so it's almost impossible to completely keep bugs out, which I completely understand.

However, like I said the building is OLD. The paper doors are all spoiled and have holes in them, the wood, especially in the Kasei room's bathing room is rotting, moldy, and has holes the allow a lot of ants, spiders and other various bugs in. I was actually really disappointed by this because I specifically booked this ryoken for the gorgeous outdoor private Osen, only for me to be way to scared of bathing with bugs that have fallen in the water, and ultimately scared to use any of the Osen facilities.

Also because of the rotting wood, when the windows all get shut the room smells like mildew, I has to keep the window cracked to keep the air fresh.

And just like Josian said, the building, but specifically the rooms could use a lot of extra TLC. But truly what I think this place really needs is the shut down room by room and replace the wood, tiles, and the paper on the doors. I really hope with the high prices they charge they do plan on renovating very soon.

All of this said I still would really really recommend this ryoken to anyone who's wants to stay in a beautiful, traditional ryoken, with very amazing staff, or anyone who hasn't been to a ryokan before so they can experience what it should really be like. But only if they aren't scared of bugs...

Not the fine and relaxing experience you expect, a few red flags you should consider before booking:l 🚩🚩🚩

1. infestation problem with ants and they very obviously don't care about it. We understand the room is in the nature setting so a handful of bugs getting in the room might be understandable, but we saw 5 ants alone in the drinking water they provided, then an additional about 10+ ants, cockroach and stink bugs inside the room. We informed front desk but other than "sorry" they didn't do anything and also left the ants dead bodies on the table after "cleaning" the room

2. don't stay if you have children-because the hotel treat them as non existent. We have two under 5 years old which we clearly reserved with. However, they get no food(dinner or breakfast) or even their own bedding. If we declared the kids and have to pay for them, why wouldn't they get their own kids meal or bed to sleep on?

3)service is poor -overall management really don't care about your experience (as we experience after telling them about the ants and they did nothing besides a verbal sorry and moving on) one of our friends asked if her fish can be cooked for dinner because she got sick a day ago eating raw oysters at a different place for dinner. Then they went ahead and changed the course from fish/scallop to tofu skin only. While we asked for accommodations which is something they offered, changing the cooking method vs switching a meat course to just a few tofu skins is not what we agreed on for them to do without talking to us first

4)moldy bath and aged building- the structures and building is very old, there is a difference between keeping the traditions but also keeping up maintenance. They definitely did not do the up keep as there are visibld molds, holds leakage, stains, dirt and smell through out the facilities if you pay attention.

For the price you pay this should be a better experience but it was very disappointing. I have had better experience at...