I stayed here again for a 4 nights at the end of September (previous reports on
AFF here and EL discussion on
Flyertalk here) while visiting in-laws, this time we had a baby in tow.
I had the 4 nights booked across three separate reservations in order to use Aspire resort credits - online prepaid rates here are processed by the property itself so they trigger the credit. We were upgraded from a base twin room to a sunset view twin room, one category but around 15000-20000 JPY per night difference.
The hotel was able to provide us with a good quality cot, nappy bin, baby seat, and plenty of extra towels - very useful.
The EL situation was largely the same except it was also open for breakfast on busy days in September. The usual breakfast buffet restaurant, Azure, is nowhere near big enough for the number of rooms in the property during peak summer. As with my last stay, the EL fare was good enough to serve as a quick and casual dinner - the hot selection included grilled chicken and mussels, and there were cold cuts, a salad bar, cheeses, bread, etc. The EL was not overly crowded when we went at the start of evening cocktails, and the food was regularly topped up / never ran out.
Azure previously offered advance breakfast table bookings to both Gold and Diamond when we visited in December 2023, on this stay it was restricted to Diamond only. Unsure if that's a perm change.
In better news, Azure was allowing guests to use their included breakfast (either Gold/Diamond benefit or package deals) for the lunch buffet until 2pm during the busy month of September. We sometimes opted to skip breakfast and just eat an early lunch - the buffet was almost identical in offering.
Azure offers a Diamond benefit at breakfast - every day it was sparkling wine and one other option. On the days we dined the other options were a green juice smoothie or locally made pudding.
The Diamond welcome gift is now some boxed sweets, was previously two local ciders.
And just uploading this EL info sheet in case anyone finds it useful...
