Hotel Route - Inn Ena

The buffet breakfast was tasty. The onsen was a decent size and bathing there felt comfortable, and the rooms also have their own baths if you’d rather shower there. The rooms are incredibly small, as is common in Japanese hotels. Once you put your luggage down, there’s hardly room to walk around comfortably. It’s a pretty standard business hotel.

I enjoy staying here when I’m in Ena. The onsen is relaxing and well maintained, and I like both the Japanese and Western breakfast options. The rooms are a little small, but that’s Japan. It’s easy to get to highways and stores.

The public bath was okay, but I wouldn’t recommend this hotel. The breakfast wasn’t good for someone who prefers bread over warm food, and the beds were the worst we had in Japan. They were so hard they wouldn’t bend even with two people on them. The rooms were small, too. It’s part of a budget chain, but the prices didn’t feel budget. The building is ugly, and it’s hard to believe they have more than 300 of these across Japan.

The room was really little, with everything I needed except space. It was very clean and seemed recently refurbished, with lots of well placed sockets. There’s real coffee in the lobby. It’s commercial, but works fine for a quick stop. There isn’t much reason to stay in Ena beyond a pit stop. The Hiroshige Museum is 750m away, and supermarkets, convenience stores, and a pharmacy are all an easy walk. Restaurants accessible to foreigners seemed scarce, so we bought sushi at Valor supermarket and ate in the room. Only later did we find out the hotel has 2 restaurants. One small, silly thing: the front desk asks you to leave your key cards at reception when you go out.