伊豆の踊子の宿 福田家 — Hotel in Kawadu

Fukudaya is not any chain or luxury hot spring hotel (ryokan) with all mod cons that caters mass tourism. Opened in 1870, it has long been a family run lodging (on the premium side) serving local Japanese tourists traveling in the Izu Peninsula – businessmen, intellects and writers, amongst them the Nobel prize winner Yasunari Kawabata, who had been a frequent lodger in the small ryokan, had his own room. He wrote one of his most well known work "The Izu Dancer" here, when he was 19. ||||The ryokan is situated in a quiet village in Kawatsu, a bit tucked away from the busy main road. It is small, serves a limited number of guests per night. It may not be the most luxurious stay however if you are into a truely Japanese household/ryokan experience, this is your place.||||The exterior of the ryokan is already picturesque enough, with a tiny wooden bridge leading to its entrance. Upon arrival, the couple owner came up to greet us (and knew who we were immediately). We booked the room where the big writer had stayed and it was a gem (Room Odoriko 1). It was one of the two biggest room in the ryokan, the low table, the sliding door, the small corridor where you could sit down and read while listening to the comforting stream of the river outside, the sound of the wooden floor when you step on it, the smell of the tatami, the traditional Japanese style dressing table, just touch of the material of the furniture with your hand and you will feel its quality. It's the real furniture they produced back in the old days. Every piece here has its own history. It is not some made up room set to please contemporary tourists who look for a bit of Japanese-ness, everything here is real. Its clientele is mainly local people. ||||Hot spring bath – there are two: ||No.1 - the Kaya (a type of wood) bath, the hotel prides itself with this traditional bath. It is also listed as one of the Japanese "secret baths", which means the hot spring water must meet a certain quality, has its own history. They are usually tucked away and travellers (mainly locals) would need to make a bit of extra effort to reach there but in return, they will enjoy tranquility and authentic onsen water. Fukudaya is not so difficult to reach. And this Kaya bath is over a century old if I am not wrong. At night, when no other guests are using, you can occupy it all for yourself (or with your family). The water temperature was a bit too high for us though. ||||No.2 is a more modern bath, with an indoor portion and outdoor portion. Again at night when no other guest is using you can have it for yourself, in the morning it has a time slot for men and another for women. The water temperature here is more acceptable. ||||Food:||We had it in the restaurant, in a room reserved for us. The food was not like from a luxurious hot spring hotel, but still very rich. And have a "home" taste to it. We went there in Autumn and had the wild boar hot pot and lots of deliciously cooked fish. ||||Reading area:||The ryokan has has a small room with documents and writings plus different versions of the novel Izu Dancer. It is not so frequently visited by guests and you could relax and sit back and have a lovely reading time. It also has Izu Dancer in different translations (including English). It is a short story, my husband read it there and he liked it.||||Izu is a lovely Peninsula and Fukudaya is a beautiful, traditional ryokan. Walking into this ryokan felt like walking into an old Japanese home. I joked with the owner it was like in the movie but of course it is real. So if you are into real Japanese ryokan experience this is the place. ||||Tip 1: in the past not all rooms has private washlet (typical of older Japanese lodging) but I have an impression they have been doing a not of renovation and most room has washlet now. No bath though, you will use the hot spring bath there. ||||Tip 2: book early, especially if you are traveling in peak season, especially if you want to stay in the 2 biggest rooms. I stayed in Odoriko 1, it's jus right beside the running river and the wooden bridge, very beautiful. Since there was no guest, the owner allowed me to have a little tour in Odoriko 7, it's a bit smaller but still very pretty, private washlet here is better, easier to access than in Odoriko 1.||||Tip 3: It is a very small village so please respect the local and stay quiet, and try to follow the local etiquettes in the...

Fukudaya is not any chain or luxury hot spring hotel (ryokan) with all mod cons that caters mass tourism. Opened in 1870, it has long been a family run lodging (on the premium side) serving local Japanese tourists traveling in the Izu Peninsula – businessmen, intellects and writers, amongst them the Nobel prize winner Yasunari Kawabata, who had been a frequent lodger in the small ryokan, had his own room. He wrote one of his most well known work "The Izu Dancer" here, when he was 19. ||||The ryokan is situated in a quiet village in Kawatsu, a bit tucked away from the busy main road. It is small, serves a limited number of guests per night. It may not be the most luxurious stay however if you are into a truely Japanese household/ryokan experience, this is your place.||||The exterior of the ryokan is already picturesque enough, with a tiny wooden bridge leading to its entrance. Upon arrival, the couple owner came up to greet us (and knew who we were immediately). We booked the room where the big writer had stayed and it was a gem (Room Odoriko 1). It was one of the two biggest room in the ryokan, the low table, the sliding door, the small corridor where you could sit down and read while listening to the comforting stream of the river outside, the sound of the wooden floor when you step on it, the smell of the tatami, the traditional Japanese style dressing table, just touch of the material of the furniture with your hand and you will feel its quality. It's the real furniture they produced back in the old days. Every piece here has its own history. It is not some made up room set to please contemporary tourists who look for a bit of Japanese-ness, everything here is real. Its clientele is mainly local people. ||||Hot spring bath – there are two: ||No.1 - the Kaya (a type of wood) bath, the hotel prides itself with this traditional bath. It is also listed as one of the Japanese "secret baths", which means the hot spring water must meet a certain quality, has its own history. They are usually tucked away and travellers (mainly locals) would need to make a bit of extra effort to reach there but in return, they will enjoy tranquility and authentic onsen water. Fukudaya is not so difficult to reach. And this Kaya bath is over a century old if I am not wrong. At night, when no other guests are using, you can occupy it all for yourself (or with your family). The water temperature was a bit too high for us though. ||||No.2 is a more modern bath, with an indoor portion and outdoor portion. Again at night when no other guest is using you can have it for yourself, in the morning it has a time slot for men and another for women. The water temperature here is more acceptable. ||||Food:||We had it in the restaurant, in a room reserved for us. The food was not like from a luxurious hot spring hotel, but still very rich. And have a "home" taste to it. We went there in Autumn and had the wild boar hot pot and lots of deliciously cooked fish. ||||Reading area:||The ryokan has has a small room with documents and writings plus different versions of the novel Izu Dancer. It is not so frequently visited by guests and you could relax and sit back and have a lovely reading time. It also has Izu Dancer in different translations (including English). It is a short story, my husband read it there and he liked it.||||Izu is a lovely Peninsula and Fukudaya is a beautiful, traditional ryokan. Walking into this ryokan felt like walking into an old Japanese home. I joked with the owner it was like in the movie but of course it is real. So if you are into real Japanese ryokan experience this is the place. ||||Tip 1: in the past not all rooms has private washlet (typical of older Japanese lodging) but I have an impression they have been doing a not of renovation and most room has washlet now. No bath though, you will use the hot spring bath there. ||||Tip 2: book early, especially if you are traveling in peak season, especially if you want to stay in the 2 biggest rooms. I stayed in Odoriko 1, it's jus right beside the running river and the wooden bridge, very beautiful. Since there was no guest, the owner allowed me to have a little tour in Odoriko 7, it's a bit smaller but still very pretty, private washlet here is better, easier to access than in Odoriko 1.||||Tip 3: It is a very small village so please respect the local and stay quiet, and try to follow the local etiquettes in the...

Fukudaya is a Ryokan outside the small rural town of Kawazu on the Izu Peninsula. This mountainous region is known for Wasabi, which you can see growing on stepped gardens carved into steep hills in the surrounding area, along with hot springs every so often. My wife and I arrived at Kawazu station from a local train that goes along the shoreline from Atami. I found a cab driver napping in the driver seat of his car and reluctantly woke him up. The ride was cash only (about 2500 yen) and was 10-15 minutes. We stopped on a narrow street and the driver said Fukudaya was down below. It started raining very hard by this time. We went down a steep path and over a small bridge that crossed a rushing stream and saw Fukudaya. The building was old, wooden, and super charming because it was separated from all structures around it and was surrounded by greenery.|The manager of the inn (Masada San) was very nice to us and quick to help with anything we needed, starting when we arrived in the pouring rain and he came with towels for us to dry off with. We were given Yukata to wear and slippers, all of which was really comfortable, although I don't think we were ever wearing the right ones.|Our room was upstairs, and we were told it is known as the room where author Yasunari Kawabata stayed when he wrote 'The Izu Dancer', which is set in Izu [there is a lot of cool memorabilia in a common area of the inn related to this writer, and they have the book and the film based on it with a little TV you can watch it on]. There was hot tea and a sweet snack in the room when we arrived and a heated blanket that you could put over your lap and put your legs under the table. It was nice to sit there and listen to the rain and be in this kind of magical old building.|Through another set of sliding doors was our bedroom. We slept on the floor with bedding and I thought it was pretty comfortable. You can hear the water outside when you're sleeping. |We were able to use the indoor and outdoor onsens there and they are really beautiful. The indoor one has a castle-like feel, and it is set way down low in the structure, with a square wooden bath and decorative tiles sparsely lining the walls. The outdoor bath is secluded with lots of plants growing around it. They do have some "men's time" and "women's time" for the baths, and there is also "private time" when we were able to go in together. You can use the baths there any time during the night as well.|We had dinner and breakfast included with our rooms. It was kaiseki style, and was a generous amount of food. We really enjoyed the fish, especially the fried one, which was basically like fried chicken - the one guy who works in the kitchen convinced me to eat the head and it was delicious; i don't remember his name, but we are both left-handed. There were a lot of elements to the meals, which were always a bit different: hot pot with shabu shabu and greens, rice, miso soup, japanese pickles, and some other seafood. There was big fish in a sweet soy dipping sauce (Shoyu Tare) that was amazing. Breakfast was similar to dinner, but was lighter and maybe a bit more western.|There is a natural area nearby that you can catch the bus to - Kawazu Seven Waterfalls (Nanadaru). Along the trail there was a little shop that featured wasabi products - we had wasabi ice cream there and it was great. If you have a notebook with you, they have little stations where you can stamp these kanji from each waterfall and that was really fun too.|Another food tip: across the nearest main road from Fukudaya is a shop that sells while bread sandwiches with strawberries and mascarpone cream (highly recommend this). |Our last day in town we went for a long walk and came back along the Kawazu river. This is a really nice spot, so I would recommend checking it out. I googled and saw there are no laws about drinking outside as long as you're at least 20 years old, so we got beers from the 7-11 and some curry bread and walked back to Fukudaya.|Overall this was one of the best experiences we had in Japan because it was so traditional and showed us a lot of the old culture there. The staff were all kind and Masada San is really fast and he is always there when you need him. I find myself thinking about this place a lot and I hope we can go...