Mikuniya — Hotel in Toyooka

My sisters and I booked room for 3 back in July 2017 for our stay September 29th. We paid using their website. They emailed us with confirmation of booking. However, I wasn’t charged in my creditcard and saw the pending transaction. I was worried the charge did not go through so I emailed them. It took about a week or so for a reply. We were told not to worry about it and our booking is still valid. About a week before our arrival I received an email from the inquiring about our allergies. I thought that was nice and thoughtful of them to confirm about our food allergies. ||We took the Shinkansen To go there overall a pleasant trip. When we arrived at kinosaki onsen station it was about a 5min walk if we didn’t keep stopping by the little shops a long the way. The ryokan was easy to find. As soon as we arrived we checked in and the greeted us and brought our luggages to our room. The ryokan was clean and airy. Even though our view was the street still felt traditional. Our host spoke Japanese and limited English but she was kind and outgoing. My Sister was able to communicate with her to have a conversation. I am able to understand enough. Im not sure if there was any host that was fluent in English or not, but either way she was very nice. We had a hard time putting on our Yakuta since it was our first time. We asked one of the staff and they kindly helped all three of us put it on. After settling we walked around the area. Plenty of little shops but they close really early (5pm???) there was a family mart that stayed open late though. We came back for dinner for 6pm they set our room and brought our food. It was delicious! Definitely worth every penny. The best sashimi I’ve ever had! We had the shabu shabu meal. After dinner we went to 1 of the 7? hot springs. The one I wanted to go was closed for some reason. The walk to the hot spring was about 5-6minutes. It was our first time going. The water was super hot. It was awkward getting naked in front of others but you’ll get used to it. At the time we went there we were the only foreigners (from US/CAn). After soaking we walked back to the Inn and our bed was ready on the tatami floor. It was comfortable! Either way from the amazing dinner and the onsen we fell asleep really quickly. We didn’t even make it to the private bath that we scheduled for 11pm. This inn had its own private bath but it’s booked by other guest quickly. We checked in a bit late. We woke up around 7am and breakfast was on the 3rd floor. Again delicious and truly an experience. I haven’t had this kind of breakfast before and tried everything at least once. After breakfast we went back into our room and packed! Check out was 10am? ||Overall an amazing experience. I will definitely come back again. You should give it a try too! I don’t usually put this much effort into writing a review but I was so pleased with them that i did. I...

We spent a night at Kinosaki Onsen in Mikuniya after being charmed by the reviews. However, what we experienced made the reviews feel somewhat overrated. Here’s for the stay: reached Mikuniya after a short walk from the station (give it about 3-5mins). Hospitality upon arrival felt slightly lacking. We were invited to pick out the coloured Yukatas (for females) and a female staff brought us to our room, sat us down and gave a short brief on what to wear and when; this took less than 5 mins after which she rushed off. There were some paper instructions on how to put on the yukata but being our first time, we were quite clueless but no one actually helped us put it on the right way - it was like they couldn’t quite care. To be fair, the ryokan did offer tea and some welcome snacks which we appreciated. Meals were ok (standard fare) although they served 4 vegetarian sets for dinner instead of the requested 2 veg and 2 non-veg sets, leaving me feeling somewhat peeved as it wasn’t what was requested. For breakfast, they offered vegetarian sets at their Sister ryokan (western breakfast) but we wanted to have breakfast together so I insisted on Japanese breakfast sets - Mikuniya acceded to the arrangement after some negotiation over emails and upon arrival (but it was actually possible hence we learned that non-mainstream arrangements will require some effort to convince). Check-out was quick but cold maybe due to language barriers. My recommendation is to go to Kinosaki during the winter season for better sceneries, more worthwhile meals (with snow crab), and moreover, cold weather makes onsens more appealing. Do spend at least 2 nights if u want to visit more onsens or explore further (check in is 3pm and check out is 10am for most ryokans). If not, 2d1n will do. There is this shop serving creme brûlée desserts in the area - from our experience, we reckoned each guest needs to order at least 1 item. We tried ordering 1 to share but were not welcomed - quite a shock and disappointment as we were totally...

Despite the individual ratings, still only one.

To get to our room, we had to go down about 30 unsafe steps (narrow treads with a metal lip which causes tripping), along a corridor, up the same number of unsafe steps, another corridor, then up another 30 steps. I had lost a lot of interest by this stage. Had we known, we would not have stayed there.

The room was comfortable, as is expected from the "genuine" experience. The toilet was small but serviceable with the normal toilet/bidet, so all good so far. The meal was served in the room, more than enough food, tasty, & no complaints.

As we are, the beds were laid, futons. I was expecting a fairly firm bed, but not something akin to concrete. It was bloody awful; a concrete mattress and rock hard pillows. We barely slept all night and I was sore all over from a lack of any give in the sleeping surface.

We arose very early and sat in the chairs just to get some relief from the discomfort of the beds. We went to breakfast (down stairs, down stairs, up stairs and up more stairs, all unsafe). Normally, in a dining area, there is some interchange between people, but no, the mood was very sombre, as if everyone had the same miserable experience.

The breakfast was alright, but nothing to write home about. Back to the room, same sets of stairs. We had a bath which was probably the best thing of the stay. We then went for a long walk admiring the town which is very scenic.

At the end of the walk, we went to the railway station to ask whether we could change our tickets for the next day for today. The answer was yes, so we went to the hotel and checked out a day early. Neither of us could tolerate another night of absolute misery sleeping on concrete.

We left, despite having paid for the extra night, with no regrets. I would not have stayed another night no matter what incentive was offered.

Some may like this sort of thing, but we are not the masochists you would have to be to "enjoy" this.

In summary, bloody awful and never, never,...