LA VISTA Kirishima Hills

The rooms were spacious and cute, with a coffee bean and grinder set. Mine had a private onsen tub on the balcony, though I preferred the other baths. The main public onsen has little tubs you can enjoy alone, plus a steam sauna and stone bath. There are also three themed private baths, and Kagura, the first one, was my favorite. Breakfast was super good at 3300 yen. The late-night ramen service is a must, and the tomato ramen was excellent. Everything was good, and this is one of the many places I'd love to come back to.

The drive to or from the airport is about 40 minutes. Our room had plenty of space for three of us, with lots of room and water taps. We really enjoyed all the hot spring baths. There was a free late-night serving of Japanese-style noodles, ice cream, drinkable yogurt in the morning, and free hot and cold drinks in the front lounge. The room also had a bathtub outside on the veranda.

The private onsens were gorgeous, and the property was lovely, clean, well kept, and set among beautiful mountains. But we had a rough time with the beds, pillows, breakfast, and assumptions made about us. The beds and pillows were painfully hard. We booked a king, but the hotel split it into two twins, assuming two women traveling together wouldn't share a bed. They also asked our genders before arrival and assumed our clothing sizes, despite us being Westerners. It would've been better if they had asked what we wanted. Breakfast's last seating was at 0900. We arrived at 0850, but nearly everything was gone, and no one offered to make anything for us. We were left with poorly made bread and a few grapes. We skipped breakfast the next day, then got a call that woke us up asking if we'd be coming to the mediocre breakfast. Maybe the area doesn't see many Western visitors, but it would've been appreciated if the hotel had asked instead of making assumptions.

We booked just the day before and came with no expectations, so the hotel was a lovely surprise. The room was nice, the onsens were amazing, and free food was a welcome bonus. The only downside was the restaurant. We wouldn't recommend dinner there, since it was much too expensive for the mediocre food.