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hotels (Page 20)

Hello Kitty hot spring lets you fill two spots at once on your Japan bingo card

Casey Baseel
Dec 14, 2014
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For most travelers in Japan, the highlight of a trip to the hot springs is the rotenburo, or open-air bath. The idea of an alfresco dip is so appealing that drawing visitors to your hot spring inn or hotel becomes several degrees harder if you don’t have outdoor tubs.

But you shouldn’t write off indoor hot springs entirely, as they boast a couple of advantages. Having a roof over your head makes them a good choice for a rainy day, and being climate controlled means less shivering once you step out of the water. Plus, if you’re heading to Gunma Prefecture, soon one indoor hot spring will give you the chance to soak in the company of Hello Kitty.

Japan
(cafes • cute • Gunma • Hello Kitty • hot springs • hotels • onsen • travel)

We search for the fabled bed and breakfast inside Narita’s runway that’s just 10 bucks a night

Casey Baseel
Dec 10, 2014

While it’s often referred to in travel literature as Tokyo Narita Airport, Japan’s busiest international air hub is actually located in Chiba Prefecture, making it about a one-hour train ride away from downtown Tokyo (and you can tack an extra 30 minutes or so onto that if you’re not willing to shell out the extra cash for the express train). This makes Narita sort of inconvenient if you’ve got an early departure, or if you arrive late and don’t feel like spending two hours in transit before you can collapse in your hotel bed.

So our interest was piqued when we found out about a bed and breakfast built so close to the airport it’s actually inside the runway area, and once we heard the rumors that it costs just 1,000 yen (US $8.50) a night, we decided to go searching for the mysterious hotel ourselves.

Japan
(hotels • Narita Airport • travel • urban exploring • weird)

Japan’s 10 best ryokan inns and top 10 hotels, as chosen by foreign visitors

Casey Baseel
Nov 29, 2014

Ask any member of the RocketNews24 team, and we’ll tell you: Japan is awesome. A lot of people seem to agree, too, seeing as how Japan gets more and more visitors from abroad every year.

But as much as we love all of our readers, and hope you all get a chance to come visit, our staff doesn’t quite have the collective living room floor space for you to crash at our apartments. Thankfully, the country has plenty of amazing accommodation, as shown by this list of the top 10 inns and hotels in Japan, as picked by foreign travelers.

Japan
(hot springs • hotels • Kyoto • ranking • ryokan • Tokyo • top 10 • travel)

Beautiful, 100-year-old Japanese guest house is so cheap, for some guests it’s free

Casey Baseel
Oct 10, 2014

For a lot of travelers, staying in a Japanese-style inn is high on their list of things they want to do in the country, and with good reason. The austere elegance of traditional accommodations provides a uniquely soothing atmosphere, giving you a connection to a culture thousands of years old even as it provides the opportunity for a quiet moment of self-reflection.

What’s not nearly so relaxing, though, are the rates many inns charge, which can run to hundreds of dollars per person in mandatory packages that include overly extravagant meals. But if you’re looking for a place to stay that doesn’t go overboard on either the amenities or prices, the hostel K’s House will provide you a 100-year-old roof over your head, friendly service, and even a natural onsen hot spring bath, all for as little as 2,950 yen (US$27) a night, or, if you don’t mind a few hours’ work, nothing at all.

Japan
(culture • deals • history • hot springs • hotels • travel)

Tokyo Prince Hotel delivers a hint of magic with Kiki’s Delivery Service suite and bakery

Casey Baseel
Sep 24, 2014

Halloween is still more than a month away, but Tokyo’s witch population has gone up by one with the DVD and Blu-ray release of the live-action Kiki’s Delivery Service. To celebrate, the Tokyo Prince Hotel is delivering a double dose of tie-ins with the main character of Eiko Kadono’s novel series and Hayao Miyazaki’s anime, in the form of a bakery selling Kiki-themed treats and a hotel suite decorated with props used by the actors in the film.

Japan
(anime • Hayao Miyazaki • hotels • Studio Ghibli • travel)

Great hotel in Hokkaido has hot spring, all you-can-eat seafood for under 10,000 yen a person

Casey Baseel
Aug 27, 2014

With beautiful natural scenery, delicious food, and an unhurried atmosphere, Japan’s northern island of Hokkaido is one of the country’s most popular vacation spots. There’s one big drawback, though, which is that airfare to and from Hokkaido can eat up a big part of your travel budget, leaving you less cash to spend on a hotel with nice amenities or local delicacies like fresh salmon roe and scallops.

Recently, though, we found a hotel in Hokkaido that offers it all, with soft beds, all-you-can-eat seafood, an all-night hot spring, and even a price that makes it a very affordable luxury.

Japan
(deals • food • Hokkaido • hotels • seafood • travel)

Get a room, you two, with this love hotel-finding smartphone app and its 2,000-yen discount

Casey Baseel
Aug 13, 2014

In many ways, Japan’s love hotels are a brilliant concept, offering a room with discreet staff, simple amenities, and large beds for couples looking for a place to physically and nakedly express their feelings for one another. There is one sticky point to utilizing them, however.

People generally find themselves in need of a love hotel when overcome by a spontaneous wave of passion, so they don’t usually book ahead. And while a hand-in-hand dash to the love hotel district can be a bit of heady fun, finding a place to do the deed is sort of a time-sensitive objective. Spending too much time walking around searching for a hotel with a vacancy can put a damper on the mood and/or contribute to your sobering up and realizing that maybe it isn’t a good idea to sleep with your boss’ nubile 23-year-old daughter, no matter how willing she says she is.

Such problems may soon come to be a thing of the past, though, with a new smartphone app that can help you find and book a love hotel in as little as 10 seconds, plus, right now, even help you out with the bill.

Japan
(app • deals • hotels • romance • Smartphones • travel)

Tokyo Disneyland Hotel adding new rooms that let you stay with Alice, Belle, and Cinderella

Casey Baseel
Jul 5, 2014

With Japan’s love of travel and fictional characters, it was really only a matter of time before hotels started offering rooms based on popular animated franchises. You can always count on Disney to have its finger on the pulse of travelers, and sure enough the Tokyo Disneyland Hotel has a block of rooms decorated with the cast of its classic films.

It’s been six years since the hotel opened, though, and management has decided it could use a little sprucing up, So next year the character rooms are being renovated, with some returning favorites getting new amenities plus the hotel debut of a few more.

Japan
(cute • Disney • Disneyland • hotels • travel)

The country that sent the most foreign visitors to Japan in 2013 was…

Krista Rogers
May 18, 2014

In 2013, a grand total of 10,363,904 foreign tourists visited Japan! That number surpasses the goal of the Visit Japan Campaign, which began in 2003 with a goal to increase the number of overseas visitors to 10 million.

The Japanese language version of popular travel planning and information website TripAdvisor was quite excited by this news, and recently produced their own visual graphic detailing some fun facts about foreign tourists in the Land of the Rising Sun during 2013. Can you guess which country most of the visitors came from, or which country had the highest percentage jump in visitors? How about the most popular tourist destinations for foreigners traveling in Japan? Find out all that and more after the jump.

Global, Japan
(countries • hotels • Japan tourism • sightseeing • statistics)

12 tales of true hospitality from Japanese hotels and inns

Casey Baseel
Feb 12, 2014

Japan takes customer service very seriously, something that’s easy to see when even convenience store clerks are so dedicated to their job they’ll ask if you want your hot and cold purchases bagged separately, or else build a protective barrier between them. Hospitality standards are no joke, either, as illustrated by the tasks traditional innkeepers are expected to perform, such as carrying the dishes and utensils for full-course meals into and out of guests’ rooms.

It’s no surprise, then, that travelers in Japan have plenty of stories to tell about attentive inns and hotels, such as the 12 below from an online survey by web portal My Navi Woman in Japan.

Japan
(culture • hotels • service • travel)

Japan’s coolest capsule hotel to close: Last chance to experience sleeping in the future!

Philip Kendall
Oct 8, 2013

Capsule hotels, the uniquely Japanese accommodation solution no doubt on every Japanophile’s to-do list, have never really caught on outside of their homeland. Whether it’s down to individuals’ ideas of what constitutes comfort and privacy, or simply the fact that so many Westerners freak out at the very thought of climbing into a space resembling something between a spaceship escape pod and a coffin, most capsule startups outside of Japan have failed. While these unique hotels continue to serve those who are on a budget or simply too intoxicated to make it home safely, and show no signs of disappearing from Japan’s cityscapes any time soon, it is with deep regret that we bring you news today that Kyoto’s Nine Hours, arguably the coolest and most modern capsule hotel in the country, is to close.

Tourists, late-night drinkers and those who have always fantasised about waking up in an Aperture Science test chamber have only until October 31 to check out the hotel and experience space-age comfort, so we’re here to show you exactly why you should head over to Nine Hours’ website right now and make a reservation.

Japan
(capsule hotels • culture • design • hotels • travel)

The new Hello Kitty suite: For a limited, cute time only!

Preston Phro
Aug 13, 2013

A few weeks ago, we introduced you to some of Japan’s greatest themed-hotel rooms, but it seems we may have jumped the gun just a bit because The Prince Hotel located in Minato Ward of Tokyo has just opened up a brand new Hello Kitty-themed suite, and it might very well be one of the cutest rooms we’ve ever seen.

Check out the photos and details of the cutest room in Japan below.

Japan
(Hello Kitty • hotels • theme rooms)

Unlimited refills of limited availability beer at Park Hyatt Tokyo

Casey Baseel
Jul 5, 2013

The five-star Park Hyatt Tokyo, known to many as one of the locations used in the movie Lost in Translation, has plenty of things going for it, including luxuriously appointed rooms, ample business facilities, and a full array of spa services. But we already live in the area and have an office nearby in Shinjuku. Plus, the natural stunning good looks of the RocketNews24 team preclude the need for any beauty treatments. So what can the Park Hyatt do to get us through their door?

How abut offering two types of beer you can’t get anywhere else, and free refills to boot?

Yeah, that’ll do it.

Japan
(beer • deals • hotels • travel)

“Oh no, I forgot to pack my Lamborghini!” Not to worry: this Tokyo hotel has got you covered

Casey Baseel
Jun 13, 2013

Among the numerous luxuries the Conrad Tokyo provides guests is the hotel’s extensive list of amenities, such as uniquely-scented soaps, shampoos and rubber duckies to make bath time in your opulent, free-standing tub just that much better.

Of course, these pale in comparison to the perks offered for the traveler who books a room in the hotel’s newest promotional package, which include a 552-horsepower mid-engined supercar.

Japan
(cars • cool • hotels • sportscars • travel)

Japanese Couple Arrested for Stealing $300 in Hotel Amenities

Steven
Oct 6, 2012

One of my favorite things about staying at a hotel is all the complimentary stuff they let you take home. From toiletries to beverages, bathrobes to coffee makers, each visit to a hotel is like a smorgasbord of free everyday items—the only limit is your suitcase!

Some people claim that not everything in the hotel is free. That aside the cheap toiletries everything in the room is hotel property and taking it home is “stealing.”

Yeah, sure. Even if that is true, what are they going to do, call the Hotel Gestapo?

No, but they will call the police, as one Japanese couple found out after being arrested for stealing nearly $300 worth of hotel amenities.