Carta Hotel Kyoto Gion

Asakusa was peaceful, and getting to other parts of town was easy. The hotel felt more like a residence, with tiny apartments that had everything we needed. Just be aware of the size if you're traveling as a couple, like we were. They’re VERY small.

The location was the one good thing. Our room on the second floor was a damp little shoe box with no daylight at all, since the neighboring building's wall completely blocked the windows. There was also a bad smell coming from the toilet.

The Wi-Fi was unreliable in our seventh-floor room, and the rooms aren't cleaned during a stay. You're meant to put used towels and rubbish bags in the hallway for staff to pick up, but they don't leave fresh bags, so we had to ask reception for them each time. The worst part was being stopped at reception on the second night over a tourist fee we'd already paid at check-in. We were kept there for 15 minutes and treated unfriendly while staff insisted we hadn't paid. They didn't even check whether they had the right guests, though we pointed that out several times. Eventually they realized their mistake. They gave us a Starbucks gift card as compensation, but €2.77 wasn't enough for the two of us to buy anything. I wouldn't recommend this hotel.

The room was so tiny we could barely fit our luggage, let alone open it. There was a horrible sewage smell from the toilet, and when we asked to move rooms or have it fixed, we were told no staff were available to deal with it. The windows made the place look nice at first, but booking this hotel for our Kyoto stay was a terrible decision. It's just a tiny room.