Sounkaku

Our Japanese-style room on the third floor was worn and clearly due for renovation. The property sits beside a road with heavy vehicle traffic, so lower floors are likely noisy. The hot water didn’t work, and the front desk basically told us to use the public bath. We only got moved to another room after escalating the issue. There’s no air conditioning either, so we had to open the windows, which made the room even noisier. We also had the 450g crab dinner, but frozen crab wasn’t worth it. Avoid if possible.

We had a room on the tenth floor, and it was clean, spacious, and really nice. The air conditioning didn’t work, though, so it got very hot at night, even with the window open in May. Dinner and breakfast buffets were great, and the free beverage bar was a nice bonus. The public bath was nice too. There were lots of tour groups, which made dinner and breakfast crowded, but at least there was plenty of food for everyone.

The hotel’s management seem to be cutting corners, though there aren’t many other choices in the area. The food was mostly good, but tour bus groups often arrived at the buffet all at once and made it crowded. Once, the entire large plate of tuna sashimi was frozen. I complained, but the young chef didn’t react. The oranges tasted off one day too. Only about 30% of the staff knew how to smile. The rest looked like they couldn’t be bothered. I’d blame management for bringing in cheap staff and not training them properly. The onsens were mostly poor. The big indoor one felt like something from the 1980s Soviet style, and was pretty horrible and smelly. The small outdoor onsen was nice, but its showers were dated. The fifth-floor rooms also looked like they hadn’t been updated since the 1980s, which isn’t great for the price.

The room was spacious, clean, and new. The lobby is set up to welcome guests, with plenty of comfortable seats and a fireplace. After check-in there are complimentary foods and drinks, including a wide range of alcoholic and non-alcoholic options, snacks, and ice cream. Best of all, it stays open until 10pm, so you can take a free drink to dinner or sit in the lobby afterward. The buffet dinner doesn’t have a huge selection, but the quality is very good. There are fewer onsens here than at the big hotels near Lake Akan.