Aoi HOTEL KYOTO — Hotel in Kyoto

It was difficult for us to find this place. The taxi driver didn't know it, and I must have walked past the narrow entrance six or seven times, in increasing desperation, before I found the nameplate of the hotel.||||To be fair, it does not look much like a hotel. Set slightly back from a busy butt narrow street, it looks like an out-sized traditional house. This is an illusion that was continued after we found our way up the narrow, bamboo-trimmed path to the front door. We were in the very lap of Kyoto hospitality. In three nights, we stayed in two different rooms, both lavishly but tastefully appointed in refined Japanese style, each ready to accommodate far more than just the two of us. Spacious, relaxing, everything we wanted was close at hand, whether in the tatami-floored bedroom, the handsomely equipped kitchen, or the large living areas. And the views! Looking out on the river. We watched the world go by for quite a while, hardly believing we were so close to the entertainment area of a huge city. We simply loved this place.||||My daughter and her husband stayed in a traditional townhouse a little farther down the road, which was, apparently, part of the same hotel. Exquisitely furnished, with an even better view down to the river than our own.||||No breakfast, but plenty of places around to eat. A little trouble when we checked in and were faced with an illegal demand for our passports, but apart from that a wonderful,...

Honestly we really enjoyed our stay at Aoi until we ran into pest issues. We had the ground floor suite with a balcony which was awesome. The room had a great design and it felt like we had our own apartment in Kyoto. The floor around the beds was pretty dusty and the bathtub looked like it either had mold or needed to be refinished, but that didn’t bother us much. The issue we had was the roaches. We stayed at Aoi for 5 days and had to deal with roaches on multiple nights. At first we thought it was a one-off because it was humid and warm out, and our room was on the ground floor. By the time we realized it was an issue, we only had one night left but we notified management anyway so that they’d be aware they have an issue. We got a response offering to move us to a room on a higher floor. We declined to move rooms because we only had 1 night left and didn’t want to pack up and move just for that. When it was time to check out, we were running 20 minutes late, which I notified staff about. Regardless, a man who I assume was the manager essentially chased us out, standing outside our room waiting for us to hand over our room keys and leave. It was really uncomfortable and surprising given that he was one of the people who responded to my email about the pests so he was aware of the...

What a swell spot.|The room was lovely. |We had a nice view of the river and would have our coffee in the morning watching people stroll by and the birds hopping around in the water. |Location was pretty ideal: Quiet but close to the metro, restaurants, and shopping.||Radiant heat in the floors. An almost fully equipped kitchen with coffee and small refrigerator. They don’t have a restaurant on-premise (or really, anything other than the rooms) so we’d buy yogurt and things the night before and make coffee (provided) in the morning. A number of convenience stores nearby. |Washing machine for mid-vacation cleaning. |Handsome bathroom although maybe a bit dark for putting on makeup (or per my wife). Fancier robot toilet than other hotels. ||Lovely linens. The bed was comfortable but will be a bit on the firm side if coming from a plush hotel before your visit here.||Room had a good sized tatami area as well. ||Desk staff were friendly...