APA Hotel Kyoto Gion EXCELLENT — Hotel in Kyoto

The first thing we noticed is that the building was under construction, surrounded by scaffold and meshed all around the perimeter, every floor, resulting in no windows to see out of, ignoring the lack of a view, which I expected in a large city. We simply could not see if it was raining out, so we had to take an elevator or stairs and judge, then return to dress accordingly.

The second black mark, was how VERY filthy the room was, I'm talking red/orange stains on pillows, wet garbage smears on the wall above the garbage can in our room, stains on the curtains, scuffs and smears on the walls in the room entryway leading all the way to the bed, water damage and possible mold on the ceiling above the bed, and finally more food streaks on the wall by the refrigerator.

When we finally mustered up the courage to say something, having never had to make a fuss about a room anywhere before this, also considering that is where we would be spending the next 4 days, and not wanting to seem like entitled foreigners, the staff were very courteous and seemingly understanding even with the language barrier, they offered us another room, to which we reviewed it with the concierge, it smelled of stale water and possible urine, making our guilt for fussing kick up to 11, we nearly just agreed, but couldn't do it, so we asked to just cancel and we would try to find a last minute switch or an AirB&B. The manager then suggested one of the renovated rooms instead, which was similar in size, and much cleaner, to which we accepted.

The only remaining issue was that the shower curtain was clearly not washed, the base was yellow, and it smelled awful, we decided to leave the bathroom fan on and let it be. As well as finding a bottle cap behind the bed when my phone charger fell back there. So, it's not a great impression of the cleanliness.

I rated the location low simply due to preference. We personally did not like waking up and immediately having to zipper ourselves into the gaggle of tourists on the sidewalk. Perhaps some guests would like not having to go to any lengths to get to the primary strip of tourist shops. But it wasn't for us, and that is no fault of the hotel. We were just unfamiliar with the area...

Location: This hotel is in an amazing location and that is ultimately why we decided to stay here. We were able to walk anywhere we wanted within the Gion area. It's really close to the Gion-shijo train station, but be aware, for those of you who will be getting around on JR rail passes, this is not a JR station. Regardless, it was still cheap and easy to get to JR stations from Gion-shijo.

Rooms: The rooms were a bit small, but that is to be expected anywhere in the area. We had two people, one carry-on sided suitcase and two large backpacks and we managed just fine. The rooms were clean and wellkept. On our first day we chose not to have housekeeping come in. When we returned to the hotel that night they had left a package of towels, robes, water and other amenities outside our door. Before booking I had read a lot of negative reviews about the non-smoking rooms having a bad smoke smell in them. We had no problems with smells at all, not even in the common areas of the hotel.

Staff: The staff was friendly and spoke English pretty well. I had a package shipped to the hotel prior to arrival and they held it for me until I arrived. Heads up, they are strict with check-out times. We were just getting ready to head out and at about 11:07 am and they called the room to remind us check out was at 11. The check-in/check-out process was smooth and quick. They even held our bags for a few hours with no problem.

Facility: The hotel was clean and offered standard amenities. There was a shop, spa for massages, a restaurant, bar, and even a Starbucks. The massage menu was limited, although I'm not sure if that's standard in Japan. I went with a 90 minute full body that turned out to be a fully clothed acupressure massage. The only reason I'm giving 4 stars is because both times we tried to go to the restaurant and bar (one time for the restaurant and one time for the bar) they were closed, despite it being within the posted hours...

This reasonably priced hotel is in the centre of the main street in Gion. If you arrive at the Kyoto Train Station you may as well take a taxi to get there as it is a good 20 minutes or so by taxi. The Bus 100 and 206 apparently get close by at the Gion stop but I never saw these buses operating at all during my stay and using them with luggage is an inconvenience to everyone.||||The hotel has a Starbucks at the bottom which if nothing else allows you to recognise the hotel easily from the street. It has a bar downstairs and a massage place that is almost always booked out (with aching feet the next appointment I could get was at 1:30am).||||Most of the APA hotels are on the cheaper side but are clean and for Japan, quite spacious. In the twin room (616 on the 6th floor) that we had, we could place our luggage on the rack and still get past between the beds and the luggage. All the usual amenities are provided. Our room had a balcony that you could step out on to.||||Walking out of the hotel to the right is a myriad of Temples and paths to walk to the must see Kiyomizu-dera Temple. There are numerous others to see along the way including the 5 storey pagoda on the same path.||||Walking out of the hotel to the left and down over the river to the right alongside the canal are numerous resturants and bars. The whole area down this way is worth exploring every night.||||Kyoto is high on my favourite cities in Japan and the APA Hotel Kyoto-Gion Excellent is a reasonably priced hotel allowing access to almost everything that you would need. The area the hotel is situated in is called Gion. A tour operator described the place as a tourist trap but I am yet to work what that really meaans, I thoroughly enjoy the area every...