Yunosawa Onsen Mori no Shiki

The staff were very polite, and lunch with the family was a real treat. Some of us ordered venison rice bowls, while others chose tonkatsu ramen or the excellent pork katsu curry. The katsu was as good as what I've had at some specialists in Tokyo. We only stopped here to eat while driving from Noboribetsu to Furano, but I'd recommend it as a stop along the way. This review is just about the restaurant.

I was impressed by the clean onsen and rest area, and the restaurant had a lively feel. The staff were super friendly and, in my experience, bilingual. I didn't stay the night or eat there, but I'll come back. I also love that the onsen is heated with especially eco-conscious methods and that they're working hard toward carbon neutrality.

We had a really nice stay and felt it was money well spent. The room was fairly spacious, with futon bedding. The onsen had both hot and cold baths, and the temperature was comfortable, not overly hot. Staff were welcoming, and it was nice to follow the Japanese custom of leaving shoes at the entrance and switching to indoor slippers. Recommended.

The breakfast was the worst part. They left us with a rice ball breakfast box that looked dated, to eat the next morning. It made me wonder whether they cared if guests might get sick. We had booked through trip.com, where the only meal choices were adding dinner and lunch, with no meal plan options. At the hotel, our food turned out to be different from what all the other guests were served. I checked the hotel's price on a Japanese booking site with meal plans, and we weren't paying any less through trip.com. I don't know whether this was a problem between trip.com and the hotel or the hotel's own issue, but serving guests poor quality food isn't acceptable. The picture shows our dinner alongside the other guests' meal and the awful breakfast box. The rooms are old, and the bath is small and shabby, with too few facilities for what we paid. After traveling all over Japan, this has been my worst onsen experience so far.