Hotel Areaone Naruto

It’s in a quiet corner of town, with a nice park nearby for morning or evening walks. The hotel is clean and very well maintained, and the owner-san is a really nice gentleman. It was very good value for money, and I’d recommend visiting.

The staff were excellent.

Naruto is one of my favourite places in Japan, and it reminds me of Wakkenai. This hotel looked like one of the cheaper options at the advertised price, but my experience was awful as a foreigner. I spent over an hour trying to book through rakuten, but the reservation wouldn’t go through. I showed the man at reception proof of the 4000 price listed on rakuten yesterday, today, and tomorrow. He wouldn’t let me have that price and raised it to 6300. I’d made the effort to go there, so why couldn’t he book it for me? Instead, he kept saying I had to book online for the cheaper price and wasn’t listening to me about how much time the site had wasted. It feels discriminatory. I’ve noticed that Japanese people pay nearly half as much as non-Japanese people for domestic travel, and I’ve seen this everywhere. I think people in Japan are generally good to their own but make things difficult for foreigners, since most don’t like foreigners. When I read Japanese reviews, nearly all of them complain about foreigners. It’s such a shame.

We stayed as a family of three, and the room was clean and comfortable. It had a loft-like setup, with bunk beds and futons on tatami mats. Breakfast was a treat. We tried Tokushima’s bamboo chikuwa, and the local-style buckwheat rice soup was especially delicious. The daigaku potatoes were expertly made too, and I recommend both. Downstairs at the front desk, there were sweets and local sake, a thoughtful touch.