Stay SAKURA Kyoto 丹波口 — Hotel in Kyoto

While I loved the hotel and the overall atmosphere, I really hated the room service.

We were informed that the room service operates between 11-14 (11am - 2pm). That's completely okay and I'm grateful to know the hours. However, there is a slip that indicates whether or not we need room service - we indicated that we do not need it and decided to sleep in instead, as we were tired.

Instead, at 12, we received knocks on the door, and after a while of knocking - the room service decided to just open the door. Luckily, we had it locked, and thought to just go back to sleep. In just 20 minutes, someone tried to knock again - we once again ignored it, because we have indicated that we need NO room service. However, the door was still being attempted to be open, and kept disturbing our rest. After I finally woke up and said that we do not need cleaning, we were left alone.

However, this raised some privacy concerns - what if the room was still being visited on other days, when we left early? What if we didn't have the room locked?

While I liked the hotel in other aspects, this one alone raised suspicion and may affect future choices for...

One of the best 3 star hotels I've stayed at in Japan, does not feel like a 3 star at all except maybe the location. The room is traditional Japanese bamboo patterned style(the photos on booking websites are essentially 1/1 accurate), it's spacious and the bed is comfortable. There is a table that can be converted to washing basin and cooking area, the bath can fit one person like the traditional small modern bath tubs the locals have in their house. Hotel provides free bath salts(Himalayan rock salt, Bretagne Algae salt, and Mermaid salt) for you to bring back for soaking, and free flow hot drinks(green tea, earl grey, mocha, coffee) you can make yourself at lvl 1 resting lounge. The hotel is also strategically located 6 mins away from Umekōji-Kyōtonishi Station, you can get for free if you have JR Pass and it's 2 stations away from Kyoto. Kyoto Aquarium and Railway Museum is located right beside the station. I highly recommend this place and will be my go to whenever I come...

Value for money, but with trade offs. Good: spacious rooms Bad: The location is not good if you are looking for fast access to tourist attractions. The train to kyoto station has a lower frequency of 10mins, and it takes about 10mins to walk to the station as well. Some of the room design doesn’t make sense to me. The only towel bar in the shower room is too close to the shower. It gets wet. There is no shower holder in the bathtub area to avoid showering at the main shower area. There is no hooks for clothes in the shower room. There is also no vanity mirror outside of the shower room, which was...