Takamiya Rurikura Resort — Hotel in Yamagata

This is a really nice hotel. It is just located across the road from a couple of ski lifts, so while not ski in/ski out, it takes just a 30 metre walk across the road from the front door before you can click your skis on. We had a western/Japanese combined room which was plenty big enough. Beds were comfortable and weren't too hard as is sometimes the case with Japanese beds. The bathrooms are the usual inserted TOTO brand moulded shower/basin set up, reasonable size but not too big. One good thing room had a separate Toilet. Room was very clean. Breakfast was buffet style and was fairly good, but for some reason, and this is often the case with Japanese breakfast buffets, the sausages and scrambled eggs are served warm or tepid. Not sure why. ||The staff were very nice and helpful with a couple of the front desk staff speaking okay English. There are lockers on the ground floor for skis and boards. There is a inside smoking area for the smokers. The on site onsen is not large but is nice. The hotel is on one end of the town which means a 800 metres -1km walk to the main street, but there are a few cafes/restaurants on the street that leads through town. WiFi is included and works ok. The hotel has a pool but it was empty, so I think that may be just a summer thing. ||Overall...

This is a really nice hotel. It is just located across the road from a couple of ski lifts, so while not ski in/ski out, it takes just a 30 metre walk across the road from the front door before you can click your skis on. We had a western/Japanese combined room which was plenty big enough. Beds were comfortable and weren't too hard as is sometimes the case with Japanese beds. The bathrooms are the usual inserted TOTO brand moulded shower/basin set up, reasonable size but not too big. One good thing room had a separate Toilet. Room was very clean. Breakfast was buffet style and was fairly good, but for some reason, and this is often the case with Japanese breakfast buffets, the sausages and scrambled eggs are served warm or tepid. Not sure why. ||The staff were very nice and helpful with a couple of the front desk staff speaking okay English. There are lockers on the ground floor for skis and boards. There is a inside smoking area for the smokers. The on site onsen is not large but is nice. The hotel is on one end of the town which means a 800 metres -1km walk to the main street, but there are a few cafes/restaurants on the street that leads through town. WiFi is included and works ok. The hotel has a pool but it was empty, so I think that may be just a summer thing. ||Overall...

The photos on the internet seemed nice. I was excited and looking forward to a nice onsen experience and kaiseki foods.||The room looks more like a business hotel than anything else, but hey, we made do.|The onsen is ok but nothing out of the ordinary. |The dinner was good, the food fresh the beer cold and the sake flavorful.||And now comes the fly in the ointment. Both during dinner and more so at breakfast, the waiter (Minami-san) kept addressing my Japanese associate rather than myself despite the fact that I was talking and commenting on the dishes. Ditto re. eye contact. I simply hate that. I don’t want special treatment but is a situation which after 30 years in Japan never fails to irritate me. It’s being a ghost. Result? I lost my appetite and couldn’t enjoy the breakfast as I hoped to. |Poor waiter training IMO.|It’s these small details which make for good or...