Chateraise Golf and Spa Resort Hotel Kuriyama

There aren’t any shops nearby, which is the main drawback. If you can live with the location, though, the rooms are huge, the views are great, and the Châteraisé restaurant has plenty of desserts and other items. The hotel attached to the golf course feels very much of the bubble economy era, with such a lavish building it almost seems wasteful. A lot of the space goes unused, which makes parts of it feel a little sad. Still, it’s an excellent hotel if the setting works for you.

I came after seeing a social media post, hoping for lunch and the cake buffet, but it didn’t quite match what I expected. At opening on a weekday, there were only about eight peace cakes, and they weren’t refilled. After those, there were Chateraise kids’ cakes for 100 yen, while the ice cream corner had only cheap bars like watermelon. The weekday lunch menu was pretty basic, mostly things like soba and curry. Once two groups had taken the piece cakes, the rest of us couldn’t get any. Maybe weekends are very different, or perhaps something special is served when influencers come to interview, but it felt too first-come, first-served.

The biggest problem was a safety concern that ruined what had otherwise been a pleasant stay. Before checkout time, a staff member unlocked my room with a spare key and walked in. They should have known I hadn’t checked out. Staff are meant to knock and wait for a response before entering, so I’m deeply concerned someone could miss such a basic step. The room was about 40 square meters, plenty large enough to put the toilet in a separate area. I stayed alone in a twin room during Golden Week on a weekday, with dinner and breakfast, for 16,000 yen. The hotel is about an hour from New Chitose Airport, and I arrived just before 5:30 PM. At the front desk I explained what I needed and asked to borrow a cart, but several staff members seemed unwilling to help. A more considerate hotel would have had someone offer assistance. That was worlds apart from the golf players I experienced the next morning. The building sits on a hill, and although our room was on the third floor, the view from the spacious room was spectacular, reminiscent of Hotel Orika in Furano. The cherry blossoms 🌸 on the golf course were at their peak. Dinner was Chinese food in the first-floor restaurant. We had the place to ourselves. I hadn’t expected much for the price, but they served a full course: a two-course appetizer platter, steamed rockfish and shrimp chili, sweet and sour pork with black vinegar, shark fin soup, fried rice, then Chateraise cake and a drink. The seasonings were high quality, and it seemed like they weren’t making money on it. The shrimp chili was prepared authentically, with boiled and fried shrimp and just the right amount of sugar. I’d order it again. Breakfast was a Western-style set. The quality milk and variety were just right, and the yogurt was ordered from the head office. Juice would have made it even better. Here are the things that took points off. I liked the bed’s firmness, but the springs hurt, and it needs a high-quality bed pad. Both bath and face towels were so thin they seemed see-through. The retro Showa-era wall-mounted hair dryer was very difficult to use. I found several hairs around the bathtub.

I’d heard a lot about the cake buffet, but after going once, that was enough for me. The staff weren’t friendly, and the cakes seemed like store offcuts, not very tasty ones that probably aren’t sold at Chateraise shops. The drink bar cups smelled fishy, which was unbearable. People who came just to eat didn’t seem welcome. They seated me on a scorching terrace without curtains and didn’t switch on the several fans there, so be warned. It’s given Chateraise a bad reputation for me, and I don’t want to go back, even for golf.