My partner and I stayed at this hotel for 4 nights. We stayed in a double room. i guess the trick with booking this hotel, is manage your expectations. i warned my partner that we would be staying in a little cave (compared to our 1bedroom apartment in Frasers, Osaka), and when we arrived in our room, with our luggage already placed in a corner (we had dropped off the luggage 2 hours before check-in), he was pleasantly surprised. Yes, it wasn’t spacious, but it was enough. we had 2 luggages and 2 carry-on bags, and even then, we had enough space to move around. We liked the Dining Guide they provide in the desk draw, we actually dined in a recommended restaurant, and thoroughly enjoyed it. The bed was not very comfy. A bit too hard for my liking. Breakfast was ok. Not great, but for a lazy stress free option for breakfast, having the buffet breakfast was ok.

The location is amazing, right outside Exit 1 of Karasuma Oike subway. Right next to 7-eleven for your mini fridge supplies and snacks. Next to 7-eleven is a sweet/dessert store Jouvencelle, which stocks many green tea sweets and other Japanese flavoured sweets, which i highly recommend to buy as gifts or just enjoy yourself. Down the alley of this block, is a Japanese charcoal restaurant, which has an English menu, and lovely traditional sunken dining tables. My partner and i dined here twice, the lunch set and dinner sets are very foreigner friendly, and they are very abundant on their quantity of food. I recommend taking the subway to Nijo, and going to the shopping centre outside JR Nijo station, which houses the Toho Cinemas, as this complex has an amazing variety of restaurants. They have a cafe which provides very nice breakfast options, next to this cafe is KFC, an amazing Italian restaurant with English menu, chinese and Japanese restaurants. On the other side of JR Nijo are more restaurants. I HIGHLY recommend trying the MOH’s burgers, they are like, mini-burgers, and they taste amazing!

My partner became lazy during our stay in Kyoto, and wanted to use the taxi to travel almost everywhere. This was easy, as taxis are EVERYWHERE! At busy shopping or tourist areas, they seem to line up and wait for you! Whenever we had a long day or night, hailing a taxi was very easy! Taking the taxi to Hanamakoji-dori, Ginkakuji, the Handicraft Centre, some random restaurant near Nijo Castle (Ikkou, a BEEF-only bbq restaurant, highly recommend it, found in the Dining Guide), was very easy from the Hotel, costing about usually about Y700 – Y1200 (about $8-$15). I recommend carrying the address of the hotel, because not all taxi drivers know this hotel, alternatively, just tell them the name of the subway, and do a short walk. Also, i recommend calling the front desk from your room telephone and booking a taxi, the receptionist will do it for you, and when the taxi arrives, they call you, or instead, you can go down and wait yourself at the hotel entrance (my partner enjoyed this as he could have his morning smoke before entering the taxi lol). On this note, i noticed the below reviewer’s comment on the car/pedestrian situation, i guess it is expected, since Japanese pedestrians and vehicles share the road. You just have got to get use to this. My partner and I didnt have any problems with this, as we both come from asian backgrounds, and our countries have this sort of traffic.

I do recommend this hotel for the subway. Karasuma Oike has 2 lines, one that travels north/south to the main Kyoto station and the other east/west, to Gion and Nijo. With the other hotels, you would most definitely have to change train stations to get to where you want.

I also do recommend this hotel, if you are the type of traveller who doesn’t require much space, or don’t spend that much time in the hotel. We didn’t really require any more space. My partner and i would travel back to our room for an afternoon nap, and, even though most reviews complained about the size of the bed, it was sufficient for us.