HOTEL PRELE ホテルプレール — Hotel in Tokyo

I was looking for a place to stay in Tokyo last minute, and this was the cheapest place ($29 CAD on HostelWorld, definitely a great price, seemed too good to be true - google was showing over 4000 yen per night on most booking sites, so I'm not sure why mine was only $29).

Checking in was very smooth and easy. On my last trip to Tokyo I stayed in a hostel and made the required deposit on HostelWorld, but when I checked in they tried charging me the whole amount, including the deposit I already made. It caused quite a bit of confusion on their end, so I'm glad that at HOTEL PRELE the check-in experience was nice and easy.

Of course, being that cheap, I wasn't expecting much. No breakfast is included, and there is no public bath. This was not surprising to me. The main negative thing about this hostel is the luggage storage situation, or rather, lack thereof. I was lucky that I had a bottom bunk and had storage under the bed for my bags, but if you are on a top bunk or have a very large suitcase you will need to find a random spot on the floor to keep your bags. There was no drinking water available in the hostel. I don't mind cupping my hands under the sink and drinking from my hands (the water was cold at least!) but if you don't want to do that, you'll have to buy water. There is a regular charging outlet in each bed, but no USB outlet. However, there are USB outlets in the common area on the top floor. The beds were OK, but pillow is flat and not comfortable. You can keep your luggage there after checkout for 500 yen - cheaper than using a public locker in most cases. Towel is not included for free. I chose to buy the low-quality towel for 100 yen, although you can also rent a good towel for 200 yen. The 100 yen towel is very thin and cheaply made, but surprisingly managed to dry me off completely after my shower, so it's good enough.

The location is great, between Ueno station and Asakusa area, and very close to Iriya station on the Hibiya line (access to Akihabara and southern Tokyo), Inaricho station on the Ginza line (access to Asakusa), and Ueno station (access to everywhere).

Overall, this hostel was great for the price I paid, and the service is good. But I don't think it would have been worth paying a higher price for. My main recommendation is to find a solution for storing bags, as the current system is quite...

Not the worst hostel, but definitely not the best. The beds aren’t very comfortable and you can feel the springs every time you moved. The rooms are quite crammed with barely any space to open or reorganize your bags and no place to lock them as well.

The hostel was extremely clean. The showers rooms were very nice and very clean, I was extremely impressed with them. however, the location of the showers being in the hallway leading to the tiny common area was not ideal.

Not a social hostel at all, it is very very quiet so if you’re looking for an extremely quiet hostel it’s the place to go, but if you want to meet other people it is not the best place.

During our 2 night stay, we had some interesting men in our room who would continuously walk by our beds and eye up our belongings, causing us to lose sleep as we felt like we had to stay awake to keep an eye on our stuff. Could’ve been better if there were locks for the storage areas under the beds.

The workers we talked to were very nice and...

Do not recommend. Everything was very cramped and old, the room smelled bad because the place to leave the shoes was inside the room and there was no space to leave luggage except on the floor of the very narrow corridor between bunk beds, so the room was always a mess and I had to walk over peoples luggage and clothes to get in and out of the room. Also the sinks for brushing teeth are inside the room, right next to the beds which doesn’t give you any privacy. There are free lockers but if your valuables are bigger than a wallet or a very small camera it won’t fit there. The eating area is very small and only has a microwave and a kettle, no fridge or utensils. They don’t offer a towel and don’t even have towels for rental, only for buying. It’s also the first hostel in Japan to charge me for keeping my backpack after check-out (500 yen). Also, the bed was very bad, I could barely sleep because I could feel every spring in the mattress and had to lay a thick wool shirt below me to make it a...