Aizuno

At least the place was clean. The rest was pretty inconvenient: it’s 10 kilometres from AizuWakamatsu, where the interesting tourist attractions are, so getting there is awkward on foot or by bicycle. I arrived at 3:45pm, but check-in was at 4pm and the host made me wait outside. At 4200 yen without meals, it felt expensive for a hostel. The host didn’t ask whether I wanted meals and assumed I didn’t. The nearest grocery store is 3km away. In October it was ice cold, with only kerosine room heaters. The other guests were local and business travellers, and it didn’t feel very friendly or social for a HI.

The view was great and it was quiet, but I had a very bad stay. The beds were hard, there was no fan or electricity for charging a phone, and the toilet was very dirty. It felt like a very bad guesthouse, especially compared with the wonderful guesthouses across Japan.

It’s a nice place, but it’s a bit out of the way and there are no lockers for secure storage.

The bread ingredients seem reassuring (^o^), and the prices are cheap. A chiffon cake is only 400 yen. It’s a bakery in Aizu, open only on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, so I managed to visit on a Monday holiday. Payment is self-service: you work out the total with a calculator and pay with PayPay.