Hotel Hakuba Century

We loved Hotel Bonfire. The staff and customer service were the best part: they replied quickly, handled our questions and concerns, and picked us up in their shuttle. The rooms were cosy and comfortable, and the hotel is right by Happo One Gondola, with plenty of food options and ski hire nearby. After each tough day of skiing, the indoor and outdoor onsen was wonderful. We’ll definitely stay again.

At over $400 a night, I expected a lot more. The breakfast was especially embarrassing: disgusting, prepacked stodge. It’s incredible that the owners still serve it when so many guests leave most of it untouched. Some of us, including me, brought our own food into the dining room. The rooms are very small, though that’s to be expected with a location right next to the Happoone gondola. The staff are pleasant, of course, and the onsen is very good.

The only things I liked were the location and the friendly staff, who sadly weren’t very effective. The hotel sits up a very steep driveway. An odd hot-water sprinkler system keeps it free of ice and snow, but it turns the whole driveway into a steaming waterfall. Without waterproof shoes, your feet will get soaked. Management seems to know, since the first sign inside says street shoes aren’t allowed, then points out where to leave wet boots beside a rack of communal slippers. There’s no central heating. After skiing, our room was very cold. The electric heater warmed it up, but at even its lowest setting the room got too hot and the air too dry, waking me several times a night. The beds were horrifically uncomfortable. The pillows were so thin I suspect they bought half as many as needed and sliced them in two. Cunning, but it didn’t fool me. There’s no kettle in the room. You have to share one with other rooms on your floor and remember to put it back. There are no cups or glasses either, so I’m not sure what the kettle is for. And ‘breakfast’ is a joke. I think they budget about JPY100 per person. That’s real ketchup on the ‘pizza,’ by the way. Checkout is at 10am. Much of Japan already has the annoying habit of making you leave at 11am instead of the far more reasonable 12:00 that the rest of the world seems to manage, so I took issue with the 10am checkout. I couldn’t get an 11am late checkout, even by paying. It seems there are only two people working at the hotel, doing everything from checking guests in and cleaning rooms to making pizza for breakfast, dealing with my annoying complaints and writing cryptic signs in Engrish. I won’t be coming back. To be fair, I didn’t see other hotels that looked better. There’s a traditional Ryokan called Marushi that looked really cool and I’d be up for trying. Otherwise, AirBnB would be my best bet.

The place was clean and well located, close to everything. That’s about all I can say for it. The WiFi was weak, there was no bar despite the hotel advertising one, breakfast was basic, the driveway was very steep, and the sauna wasn’t working. Keep looking, don’t bother staying. Just been 2018.