- The Hotel Okawaso in Ashinomaki Onsen,
Fukushima Prefecture, Japan.
I'm Chris, this is Yellow Productions.
I do travel guides that are fun, informative, entertaining.
And in this video,
I'm gonna tell you everything you need to know,
if you're considering staying at this hotel,
including the common areas of the hotel.
We'll take a look at the outside of the hotel.
We'll take you in the hot springs of the hotel
and I'm gonna show you
one of the most amazing rooms in this hotel.
It's truly amazing.
We're gonna have kaiseki dining,
which is one of their amazing dining experiences,
and I'll show you breakfast here as well.
So without further ado,
let's take a look at the front of the hotel.
So arriving at the hotel,
you probably won't be walking.
Three main ways you're gonna get here.
You're either gonna get here driving,
you're gonna get here from a shuttle bus
that the hotel operates from the nearest train station,
or you could take a taxi to get here.
But when you do get here,
it's a 10-story hotel, 110 rooms, circular driveway.
This is the entrance.
Let's come and take a look.
So to get in the hotel from that circular driveway,
the first thing we go over
is we go over this bridge
that's over this neat water feature,
and then the front entrance is just this way.
When you check-in at check-in time,
there will be a lot of staff here waiting to take your bags,
and help whisk you up to your room.
Really neat sliding doors
that have this Japanese theme on it.
Come on in to the main lobby.
It's a really neat main lobby.
This is where you saw me start the video right down there.
But just to the right is the check-in area.
Nice kinda woody check-in area.
Oh, by the way, it's so nice and warm in here.
It's February and it's really cold outside.
Okay, take a look at this,
which is where I started this video.
Just look down here.
So this is where people will be performing the music
from four to six p.m.
Down there, there's restaurants
where you can have kaiseki dining.
I'm gonna show you our kaiseki dining later.
And something else that's really cool about this lobby
is it's got this whole water feature underneath it.
So when you're in here,
you hear the sound of rushing water all the time.
And if you get to eat dinner in one of these rooms
that are right down here,
well then there's the rushing water
underneath you the whole time.
We're gonna take a look over this way.
And right over here,
there's a really neat lounge.
It's a bar.
You can sit there, relax,
and you can look at the great view over the river.
There's public baths which I'm gonna show you.
Not this one,
I'm gonna show you the other one later.
And then of course, there's a souvenir shop right here
'cause you wanna bring back some souvenirs, so.
Just next to the souvenir shop
is a whole bank of vending machines.
First is a cigarette vending machine,
next up is an ice cream vending machine
with lots of different Japanese ice creams,
then we've got Japanese drinks.
By the way, if you don't know,
Japanese vending machines are amazing.
And they have an amazing supply of stuff.
So definitely look at these to get drinks
and they're not overpriced
like most hotel vending machines are.
You can get these drinks for $1.80 or $1.50.
I've converted that from yen to U.S. dollars.
And then finally, there's one more right here,
that even has things like apple juice and green tea.
So at this hotel,
they have a lot of different entertainment.
Every night here at 8:30,
they have rice pounding right here.
And so make sure you check out the shows,
because it's a Japanese culture experience.
If you've never seen them before,
I think you'll find it quite enlightening.
So one of the really nice things about this onsen hotel
is it has not just outdoor onsens
but it has outdoor onsens that you can book privately
which is what we're actually in right now.
I've never been able to shoot in one of the onsens
that are typically used for the hotels
because there's always other people in them
and you have to be naked in it.
And so that's something
that they don't really like cameras in.
But here, they've got four times every night,
that you could book the onsen all to yourself
for just 3,300 yen.
So about $30 U.S. for 45 minutes of private onsen time.
And by the way,
something interesting about the water in this onsen
is that the water has sulfur in it
but it doesn't smell.
Actually, most onsen water
smells quite a bit and this doesn't.
And by the way, right now here in February,
it's actually snowing right out there
and that's the classic time to be in an onsen,
but it's nice because this has a wooden roof over it,
though I will point out
that the walk down to this onsen is not heated.
And so if you're here in the winter,
it's a bit cold before you get into the water.
And they told us that this water
is actually hotter than normal onsen water,
but it didn't seem like it when we got in it,
maybe because it's so cold outside.
But I think that's a great reason to book this.
If you've been concerned about going to an onsen
because you don't wanna be naked with other people.
Well you don't have to be
'cause you can book this one just to yourself
or perhaps with your significant other.
And another great thing about the onsen water here,
is that they have a lot of hot water that comes in
and so they don't recycle the water all day.
The water stays pretty fresh
and it feels pretty fresh and looks pretty fresh.
So today, I wanna show you around
not just any room in this hotel,
but the best room in this hotel.
This is Room 1001, a suite on the tenth floor.
Come on in, let me show you around.
As you come into this room,
you first start in this grand entry lobby.
It's tatami mats that's traditional in a Japanese room.
So we take off our slippers
and come up on the tatami mats.
We've got two ways to go
but we're gonna go ahead and come in this way
through the awning,
open this up for the camera to come in.
Now we've got three ways that we can choose to go in
but let's go ahead and choose to go in this way.
I'm gonna call this the grand salon of the room.
This is where you come in
when you check in,
you have a seat right here
and the person bringing you to your room
will prepare some green tea for you.
There's the ceremonial altar.
In the next room, which is this way,
if you just have a couple people in the room,
they'll set this up.
It's the bedroom with a couple of futons here on the floor.
If you have up to six people,
then they'll also move this table
and put beds over here.
Now let's go ahead and come this way.
This is just a little bit of a hallway
but this hallway's here
'cause you could actually connect this to another room
if you've got more than six people.
In the daytime,
there's a great view of the stream and ravine down below.
There's some mirrors,
a little seat that you could sit there.
For the camera person,
I'll ask them to watch their step
as they come down here
into the living room portion.
This is something
you don't see almost ever in onsen hotel rooms,
at least none of the ones that I've typically stayed in,
but it's got sofas,
it's got a television over there.
There's another window over there
that has the screens on it.
There's some artwork right here.
And let's go back this way.
This room is nearly bigger than our house, I think.
And this is where they keep the tatami mats.
Was there one more spot that I missed this way?
No, we were good.
And so now as we go
into the main entry way again,
if we go the other direction,
it feels kind of like a mouse finding cheese,
a little bit of a maze.
As we come this way,
we've got two choices for the bathroom.
And I always find this kind of interesting.
It's fairly common in onsen hotels.
Two choices for the bathroom,
and I'll show you in one and then we'll go in the other.
This one's the toilet room
and so I wanna point out,
there are toilet slippers here.
So you'll wear the toilet slippers
as you come into the toilet room
and as I walk into this toilet room,
the seat lifted up as I walked in,
and the light turns on and it sprays
because it's the really fancy.
Take a look at this giant control panel right here,
to do everything from clean and dry,
and pressure and position,
and deodorize the toilet seat as well.
There's a sink in here.
I'll take off my toilet slippers
'cause we're gonna go in the next bathroom section.
It's an onsen hotel,
so in your room,
you're gonna get a couple of bath towels
and some towels to take to the bath,
and a couple of bags to take it with.
But then this also has a large shower in it
and I love this because Japanese hotels
typically have really small bathrooms.
The last bathroom I was in,
I could not stretch my arms out,
and I can stretch them out all the way here.
There's a bathtub,
big soaking bathtub,
plus this, and I wanna call your attention,
if you'll come in here to the bathroom.
This is a bathroom with a view.
It's got a window that looks out there.
So pretty amazing room.
So one of the best parts about staying in any onsen hotel
is definitely the dinner.
And so if you stay in an onsen hotel,
make sure you book the room rate
that includes dinner.
Today we have a traditional kaiseki meal
which means it comes with lots of different courses.
To start, we've got a few different appetizers
that are here.
We've got a little bit of soup
with some Chinese herbs.
Right here in the middle,
we've just got this bowl of sashimi delivered to us.
And it's actually, it's really slippery,
because this is made of ice.
My hands are getting cold right now.
But there's maguro tuna.
And some other different pieces of sashimi there,
and then in here,
come on in and take a look at this.
Plus, in here, this hasn't been turned on the fire yet.
We're gonna eat this a little later.
There's some local Fukushima beef and some asparagus
which is a very popular local plant from Fukushima.
And of course,
this all goes down very well with beer,
biru,
and we've got some glasses for sake
and we've got some sauces for some,
this yet to come,
this is the whole menu
in Japanese
but you'll see it all in pictures as it comes out.
Okay, so I've devoured all those courses I showed you before
except the beef.
That still hasn't been cooked yet.
And the next course we got was the basashi.
What's basashi?
Basashi is horse sashimi.
And we have a special dipping sauce for this one.
Tender, spicy.
Combination between the sauce
and also the ginger on top of it
but very fresh tasting.
The next course was a very decorative plate
with some sea bream, sweet potato on top,
and ooh, this jello with the plum inside.
This looks like a piece of art work.
And our beef has started to cook.
Mmm, mmm, mmm, mmm, mmm.
Next course, a little cup of chawanmushi.
Egg custard.
And the last course before dessert,
soba noodles and soup.
Those noodles, you dip 'em in the soup before you eat it.
And the final course, dessert.
A cheese souffle with pudding,
a little thing that looks like a cake.
A strawberry, a very orange orange,
and a cup of tea.
I just had a good night's sleep on our futon mattresses.
It's the next morning.
It is 7:30 a.m. and before breakfast,
I've got my little bag with my two towels in it,
and I'm gonna go take,
I'm gonna go take another bath.
But I'm gonna go take this bath in their other onsen
that I can't show you
because this one's not private.
But I'll tell you about it afterwards.
See you!
(upbeat music)
All right, well I finished a relaxing plunge
in the open-air onsen.
And if you're wondering where it is,
it's actually just out down there.
It looks out at this amazing ravine and river
and it's a three-tier open-air onsen.
It's nicer than the other one.
It really is.
It was pretty good.
And I'm probably super backlit right now,
but they have this
special milk here from Izu Region.
This is some coffee milk that,
OC girl had finished her open-air bath before I did.
So she was enjoying it and saved a little bit for me.
It's pretty good.
I love the milk from Japan.
You should try it when you're here.
And actually in the onsen,
there's a vending machine
that vends these bottles out of a vending machine.
Pretty neat.
Really, one of the great parts about outdoor onsens
is looking at a nice nature scene.
And this nature scene is really nice
especially with the sound of the rushing water,
and the snow here in February.
So at breakfast, it's a really big breakfast buffet,
and first things first,
I mean, I've got my food,
but before I eat,
they've got these arm bands to put on your arms,
to help make the sleeves smaller,
so that way you don't get your sleeve in the food.
This is pretty creative, I have to say.
Now let's take a look at what we've got here on the plate.
We've got some French toast
with honey from Izu region,
some rice, some miso soup.
These look like some dumplings.
This is some special yogurt made in Izu
with also the honey made in this region,
and I think, I think this is persimmon.
One of my favorite things in Japan, milk,
and this one's from the Izu Region as well.
Had the coffee milk earlier,
same company here, on the buffet.
So much better than milk in the U.S.
And one more item.
They've got onsen eggs.
These are eggs that have been boiled
in the onsen hot spring water.
Overall, the breakfast was really quite tasty
and a great way to cap off our stay.
It's a big buffet and so there's lots more choices
than just what I had on my plate.
The final thing I wanna mention about this hotel,
is you don't have to worry about getting stuck
with a room without a view.
All of the rooms have a view of that canyon
with the river down below.
And if your travels are taking you to Fukushima Prefecture,
you might enjoy watching some more videos
from my Fukushima series.
You can click either on the screen
or links in the description below.