Tokinoyu Setsugetsuka — Hotel in Hakone

Overall, the staff were very polite and able to speak English well enough! Sadly not tattoo friendly, but we chose this place knowing that would be the case as we wanted to focus on sightseeing instead. The beef shabu shabu dinner is the better choice, and the breakfast is suuuper salty. Make sure to show up before 8am to be seated for breakfast. They also have a free ramen snack from 10pm-11pm. There’s not many dinner options in the immediate area and the konbinis either close at 7pm or are a bit further away, so if you didn’t get dinner included with your stay, then you might have a hard time finding dinner if you don’t take a bus to the city. Make sure to prepare dinner options in advance in that case.

We tried to go to the private bath, but it was often full. There are lights at the bottom that indicate if it’s in use or not: light on = in use. Note that the lights in front of the private bath are just regular lights, they’ll be on regardless of usage. We didn’t know that, and another couple literally stole the open bath right in front of us (we were standing RIGHT in front of the door too) without asking if we were gonna use it simply because we stood around for a second too long, wondering about the lights or if the door locks would show “occupied”…

The outdoor bath in our room was also really nice! I liked it better than the private bath since we were able to get a good view outside. It seems almost no one used their personal bath, as we didn’t hear any voices or water running around us. It was very very cold during windy nights, however, not a good combination when you’re showering outdoors.

The location was a really good spot, literally next to the buses and train station! Note that everything seems to kind of close on Wednesday!!!! We didn’t realize this and no one posts their open days/hours, and almost all the little stores next to the hotel were CLOSED on Wednesday, so sadly we actually never got to explore the immediate area at all. Very close to the Hakone Open-Air Museum and the Hakone Ropeway. A bit further away, but there’s also the Hakone Glass Museum, which looks amazing when the sun’s out!

Also advice to those traveling with luggage - DON’T! Make sure you figure out how to find / take buses before coming. The buses were suuupppeerrr packed and it was a nightmare to store our luggage and retrieve them when it was time to get off our stop. The train may take 15 mins longer, but the extra space is WORTH IT. In fact, I recommend coming here with little to no luggage at all so that you can move around more easily. The Google Maps directions don’t usually translate the stop names for the buses and trains in Hakone, so you really have to pay attention to each stop.

The buses and trains move really fast, so heads up that you’ll see some nice views but it’ll be hard to take pics of them.

Due to the sulfur, we smelled like sulfur after leaving!! We came back home and still smelled sulfur somewhere lol (which we didn’t mind but a heads up). Also it caused giant clouds and so it was cloudy / rainy most of our visit :(( Make sure to plan your visits on a sunny day for best views!

Also, make use of the Hakone Daypass, which covers all transportation from the Odakyu company, the railway, and discounts some events!! You have to keep the page open at all times so internet access is needed — load it a few mins before you’ll use it, and just show the QR code to conductors and staff. They also have you scan it at some train stations. Some museums even give you a discount if you show them the pass.

Lastly, make sure not to plan too many activities in the day — most stores open around 10am-11:30am and close around 4pm-5pm.

Overall, I think it was a pretty good start for our...

I paid HKD $3000 (=around 600,000 Janpanese Yen as of the exchange rate on 2024.04.26) for a night of stay with two meals in this hotel, but what I got is far below my expectations.

First and the most disappointing is the food, almost like the worst I have ever had, I don’t expect to be served with food in this quality in an onsen hotel.

The main courses of my dinner set included a beef hotpot and 5 pieces of self-selected sushi, the texture of the beef is qualified, but it was unacceptable to be heated in tasteless hot water, what’s worse, the two types of sauces they offered destroyed the taste of the beef.

Also, the seafood on the sushi rice tasted like the takeaway I got from Aeon supermarket or chain food store-sushiron, they just gave you really salty soy sauce to cover up the unfresh taste of the sushi. There was tempura came with the meal too, again, it was another disappointment, the texture was as soft as towel or cotton pad, they told me one of the items of the tempura dish was shrimp, but turned out it was baby dried shrimp, I was confused, cause clearly they were not the same thing, whats more, they even screwed up the last thing that a Japanese should have handled well, which is miso soup, I felt like I was drinking one from Yoshinoya, or can I say the one from Yoshinoya is “as good as” the quality provided in this onsen hotel?

Last but not least, I wanted to leave the dinning table before the dessert was served, because the food was so bad that I forgot there was dessert, and of course, the taste of the dessert was worse than the one I got from the vending machine in hallway of this hotel.

To be fair, there were other things that they did well, like they offered you many free candies, cookies, drinks… and you could have free ramen as nighttime snack, the location of the hotel was good, which was just a few minutes walk from public transportations, and the hot spring was healing and relaxing, but I guess one won’t go for a night in an onsen hotel just for the free stuffs and the convenient location?

There are no doubt there are many other better choices as this is Japan! I guess those who gave good comments seldom have Japanese food? So that’s why they were fooled by the hotel, or they treasured experience rather than good quality.

If you stay in this hotel by joining group tour, or you got big discount from online agency, it’s totally fine, if you paid real money for enjoying a night, believe me, there are many better choices, and please consider before you go for this hotel, or else,...

We spent one night here with our pre-teen kids as part of our summer vacation. Overall this ryokan is ok, but could be better with some improvements and attention to details.

Location is great, it is just next to Gora station. But if your room is facing the railroad like ours, there might be train and train crossing noises basically from early morning til late night. It is fine with us, but may be annoying for some.

Reception staff can be better. We were helped by a young lady for check in. She had a poker face with a rather not so friendly tone, and I felt like she just wanted to get this check in process done quickly. Receptionist is the first person a customer meets when entering the hotel. A friendly attitude is the first step to make the hotel stay experience wonderful.

Food was ok but not great. We chose the wagyu shabu course. The wagyu beef had so much fat that it felt like a low grade beef bought from a cheap supermarket. For the breakfast we were told the egg, rice and miso soup can be refilled/reordered without extra fees. But once the initial round of food was served, waitress were gone and didn't come back to check on customers. So we couldn't get the second round even though we wanted to. Portions were great though, just to be fair.

My spouse and I wanted to try the family outdoor private hot spring facility. There are 3 total. We were told that if the outside light is not on, it means it is empty and you can go in. However there's no time limit for these facilities, and customers just take their time and after 30min of waiting, we gave up. Again good facility to have, but usage procedures can be improved for customer experience.

We came to Hakone for our honeymoon in 2006, and stayed in another ryokan in Yumoto area. It was such a great experience and memory, that we brought our kids to Hakone again 19 years later. Have to say the experience this time is not as great. Again to be fair, overall the hotel is ok. But with the price tag they are charging, customers could and should enjoy a better...