Oogane Onsen Grand Hotel

I had a bad experience here in November 2017. The hotel and hotspring were poorly maintained, the food was terrible and not even Japanese, and the outdoor hotspring was lukewarm. There was slime on the bottom of every hotspring pool. Tom at this place

Thirty years ago, it was a healthy hotel, and an incident involving it was in waste processing. Management will be very.

The hot spring water was excellent, and I really liked the taste of the tap water too. It seemed rich in calcium, like the hard water you often get in Europe. There was bottled water in the room as well. At check-in, they’d already filled in a form with my name, address, phone number, and other details, so I only needed to check it and sign. That was very welcome after a tiring day. The building is old and has a strong Showa-era, bubble-era feel. It may once have been a lively, high-status hotel, but now it has changed into a cheap place for construction workers. The facilities are old, but repairs and cleaning are well taken care of, so I had no problem with them.

This place is a good fit if you like B-grade spots. It’s not for people looking for an expensive, polished hotel. I’d read online reviews, including YouTube comments, about ghosts and ruins, and thought that sounded fun, so I booked a weekend stay. It was 5,000 yen for a room only. The walk from Ogane Station took about 20 minutes, with a convenience store along the way where I picked up some food. The station issue isn’t the hotel’s fault, but even though Ogane Station is on the JR line, it doesn’t accept Suica. Some regional stations have Suica gates, but there aren’t any here, so you can’t just exit with your card. When you board, take a numbered ticket and pay at the staffed gate in Utsunomiya. There’s wear and tear around the hotel: torn closets, damaged hand towel racks, paper peeling on the windows, and weak air conditioning that blows cold. Still, for 5,000 yen, you get a hot spring soak and a place to sleep, so it didn’t bother me too much. I’d seen complaints about the service, but the young woman at reception was very friendly. The hallway lights go off at 11 PM to save energy, and I was glad I got to see the place.