Tokyo Travel Forum

Hello,
We are planning a vacation to Japan in November for 10 days and we want to visit Tokyo and Kyoto. I did some research and I must admit that I am a little bit overwhelmed by all the information. We are looking for a decently priced (not more than $180 per night) accommodation in Tokyo and Kyoto that is close to the train station (5 min walk). We also want a hotel that is close to some attractions, so we do not have to spend up to 1 hour to get there from the hotel. Is this something doable in the price range we are looking at or we need to get back to the drawing board and increase our budget?

Here are some of the options we were thinking of. Any suggestions/feedback is greatly appreciated!

In Tokyo:
1.Oak Hotel (http://www.oakhotel.co.jp/english/)
2.Chisun Inn Asakusa hotel Tokyo (http://www.asiarooms.com/japan/tokyo/chisun_inn_asakusa.html)
3.SAWANOYA RYOKAN (http://www.tctv.ne.jp/sawanoya/)

In Kyoto:
1. Azuki-Ya (http://www.h6.dion.ne.jp/~azuki/)
2. Royakan Uemura
3. The Palace Side Hotel (http://www.palacesidehotel.co.jp/)

Are there any other places that we should consider staying at? We are looking for a nice, clean room, close to some of the sites and the train station, but in a location that does not take a lot of time to travel to the tourist attractions in each town.

Also, is it a much better idea to stay 1 night close to Narita Airport (our flight gets there around 5pm) since I understand that it takes about 1 hour to get to Tokyo from the International Airport?

Any suggestions are more than welcome!
Thank you,
Monica

In Tokyo the very best budget ("Businessmans hotel") hotel that I ever stayed in anywhere - Asia Center of Japan (Asia Kaikan). Full details on my Japan page, Tips:Hotels & Accomodations.

In Kyoto I stayed in the Palace Side Hotel. It was fine. I was spoiled after the Asia center of Japan and it felt like a bit of a let down, but it was certainly
an average, or even above average budget hotel. The breakfast left something to be desired but was sufficient. The location perfect. The local bus/metro were very close by and easy to use. Just across the street, as the name implies is the Imperial Palace garden, a lovely place for a stroll. Lots of convenience stores within a couple of minutes walking and even a couple of workingmens/students restaurants where I ate most of my dinners.

Have fun!

we also used japaneseguesthouses.com to book all of our accomodation for a month in japan. they were very easy to use, and have a great range of accomodation prices. all of the rooms we booked through them included breakfast and dinner. they are well worth a look.they also provide you with adresses in japanese which was sometimes very handy! have a nice trip!

Thanks a lot for all the great tips!

Only be careful with "RYOKAN". In Japan there are diffrent types of hotels, western ones and japanese ones. RYOKAN = hotel in japanese language, western ones in japanese will be "hoteru". The first one is a typical japanese style of life , I mean the coomon bathroom and etc. It is not alweys comfortable for those who live in Europe.
I would advise to read more in travelguide book about diffrents types of hotels and resorants in Japanese.
Don't forget that hotels are to be closed by evenings, you should remember it not to stay on the street.
Have a nice trip

Only be careful with "RYOKAN". In Japan there are diffrent types of hotels, western ones and japanese ones. RYOKAN = hotel in japanese language, western ones in japanese will be "hoteru". The first one is a typical japanese style of life , I mean the coomon bathroom and etc. It is not alweys comfortable for those who live in Europe.
I would advise to read more in travelguide book about diffrents types of hotels and resorants in Japanese.
Don't forget that hotels are to be closed by evenings, you should remember it not to stay on the street.
Have a nice trip

Only be careful with "RYOKAN". In Japan there are diffrent types of hotels, western ones and japanese ones. RYOKAN = hotel in japanese language, western ones in japanese will be "hoteru". The first one is a typical japanese style of life , I mean the coomon bathroom and etc. It is not alweys comfortable for those who live in Europe.
I would advise to read more in travelguide book about diffrents types of hotels and resorants in Japanese.
Don't forget that hotels are to be closed by evenings, you should remember it not to stay on the street.
Have a nice trip

Only be careful with "RYOKAN". In Japan there are diffrent types of hotels, western ones and japanese ones. RYOKAN = hotel in japanese language, western ones in japanese will be "hoteru". The first one is a typical japanese style of life , I mean the coomon bathroom and etc. It is not alweys comfortable for those who live in Europe.
I would advise to read more in travelguide book about diffrents types of hotels and resorants in Japanese.
Don't forget that hotels are to be closed by evenings, you should remember it not to stay on the street.
Have a nice trip