Kashobou Fukumatsu

Starting with the positives, the hotel manager was very friendly and inquisitive about our stay so we had a great conversation with him when he arrived. Other than him, I saw no other staff in the hotel. The hotel while dated has a retro Japanese look which makes it a wonderful building to explore and experience. The Japanese style rooms were clean, very spacious and quiet at night which meant we got very good sleep. If you can manage a futon then you will have a great sleep, if not, then maybe not the recommended stay for you. The shower in our room was boarded up so you will have to use the onsen (segregated by gender in Japan) to shower with shampoo and body wash already provided in the onsen. Speaking of which, the Onsen was nice and spacious though quite simple; something which looked like a sauna/steam room was shut off so I don't know if this part will ever be reopened. The outside onsen was colder than expected. Despite the size and impressive nature of the building, there is less to do other than the Onsen on the lowest floor and a couple of exercise bodyweight machines/toys for kids in the reception area. Dining options are very limited as shops and restaurants are in the centre of town and are on limited working hours so there is hardly much to do in the evening other than the Lawson (large convenient store) up the road. This leads to the next point that the location is the biggest challenge, especially if you come by train. There is a 5-10 minute walk to Kinugawa Onsen station and while this station connects to Nikko, public transport times are not as regular to get to Nikko/Connecting lines to Tokyo, so please plan ahead. If you are driving you should be fine. In short, if you are looking for a budget stay in the region, this ryokan is worth its value for money. However, other than the onsen, there are not as many amenities and you will find you will want to explore Nikko and further afield during the day.

The hotel is situated not too far from Kinugawaonsen station. It doesn't have meal options and the hotel is rather run down. During our stay, we felt there was no other customers but hotel owner claimed full house for the weekend. The room itself is actually OK. Cleanliness was acceptable. The Onsen was average and occasionally the outdoor onsen was cold.

First of all, the hotel is in Kinugawa Onsen and not in Nikko. This is a 40 minutes train ride away from Nikko in which you have to change in between (which can be hard as most of the staff up there doesn't speak any english). Also there is no JR trainstation near this Hotel, if you are using the JR Railway pass you need to spend at least 2000 Yen extra for Transportation. About the Hotel: They don't accept any credit Credit Cards at the reception, so you need to pay cash. I had to use the provided bicycle to ride to the next 7/11 while it was raining heavily to get enough money. I'm a person that is satisfied easily with Hotel rooms but this room was just dirty. The bathroom smelled like a dirty public toilet, and there was a weird smell in the Hallways. The shower was broken. I found dead insects in my room and the windows were really dirty. The bathing area is quite nice, but the pictures look much better than in real life. The sauna was broken during my stay. The whole Hotel makes the impression like it's looking clean on the outside, but if you take a closer look you see that it is dirty. There are not many Restaurants around and there is almost nothing to do at night. The only thing that is nice about this Hotel is the view. I would not recommend staying there for anyone.