Notes

TravelswithMyself did such a wonderful job reviewing in May—I am going to adopt that general format and add my observations and photos & try not to duplicate too much. Since we had an 8 day stay, we really feel as if we came to know this place. To tell the truth, it was difficult to leave.  This was truly one of our favorite hotel stays ever.

A few notes:

As a prior poster stated- there is no bar or lounge per se. However there is a wonderful riverside café (Saryo Hassui) with indoor and outdoor seating with gorgeous views of the river and the Arashiyama Hills where Platinum members are served complimentary champagne, wine and snacks from 4:30 to 6:30 pm daily.  The champagne they serve is high quality (Henriot Brut Souverain from Reims, retailing at $47 a bottle) Sitting outside by the river sipping champagne became a delightful daily ritual. We also enjoyed visiting with the friendly staff at the café.

Our room did come with a Nespresso machine. We enjoy our morning coffee and after the hotel learned our preference, housekeeping left 8 (instead of 4) Espresso capsules for us daily.

The room service menu seemed comparable to the other hotels we stayed at in Japan. A previous poster quoted 7000 yen for a burger.  It’s actually half that- 3500.

The hotel does provide spa services.  The only one we tried was an in room foot massage.  A full hour was only $130.

The Hotel

As mentioned, the hotel is at the end of a cobbled street on the riverfront, across the shore from the tree covered Arashiyama Hills. Once you walk through the thatched gate you enter a calm oasis. The message is clear-  this is a place to relax and unwind.  The décor of the hotel is a tasteful mix between a traditional Japanese Ryokan and a contemporary Western hotel, with Asian motifs and a beautiful Japanese garden.  After the frenetic pace of Tokyo and Osaka we were craving a luxury boutique experience and this was exactly what Suiran provided.

Our check in was conducted in the peaceful lobby by a gracious kimono clad receptionist.  It was a warm welcome that started our visit off on a great note. We were then escorted to our room by another staff member who demonstrated the features of our room and further explained the amenities.  She also custom set our room temperature and our outdoor onsen (hot tub)

The Room

We were upgraded to the Presidential Suite, so of course it was amazing. Our room was on the 3rd floor with panoramic views of the Hozu River, the Arashiyama Hills and the historic Togetsu-Kyo Bridge. The layout was perfect, with a separate dining area overlooking the river, a comfortable sofa with a picture window view of the wooden bridge, a large bedroom and sitting area,  a lavish master bath and a smaller WC room off the hallway.  There was ample closet and drawer space and a coffee nook over the honor bar.  The hotel had also delivered a nice fruit basket and welcome note.

The room had wonderful large windows with remote controlled shutters that you could open or close with a touch.  This made it easy to take full advantage of the stunning views.

We loved our walk in shower with a rain water showerhead. At the Park Tower Tokyo and the St. Regis Osaka the water temperature had been restricted, but here we were able to adjust to our desired temperature. The walk in shower was spacious and well designed with views of the mountains. It was one of our favorite hotel showers we’ve ever had. As noted, the bath products are the same as the St. Regis- Remede.

A highlight of our room was our outdoor onsen, which was in a very private patio area accessed through our shower.  Both bathrooms had the strangely addicting Toto Washlet toilets we found at all our Japanese hotels.

The floors in our room were dark wood with area rugs (which we much prefer to carpeting).  The color scheme was relaxing and our dining chairs and pillows were the same pretty teal as the staff ties and kimonos.

Turn down each night delivered two neatly pressed Yukatas (dressing robes), a nightly snack like lemon drops or cookies, complimentary water, espresso capsules for morning, lowered our shutters and left a little card with the next day’s weather info.

I didn’t see an ironing board or iron in the room (nor did I request one)

The WiFi was excellent and we appreciated the fact that it kept you logged in for the entire stay.

There were no paper newspapers available but they did offer digital.

When you entered the room you had to insert your key card in a little slot at the entrance in order to turn on the electricity.

The Service

We found the service at Suiran to be on par with top luxury properties we’ve visited, like the Post Ranch Inn.  We always felt as if our comfort and satisfaction was their highest priority. The concierge and all of the staff were wonderfully accommodating and friendly. While everyone’s English was not perfect, it was very good, and to be honest, the language idiosyncrasies were part of the charm and pleasure of our visit. If we travel around the world we are not looking to replicate a US stay. 

We experienced exceptional hospitality and impeccable service.  Hiromi Masuyama, the concierge, and Mitsue Kawakami were especially helpful, helping us to arrange our restaurant reservations and transportation, printing out maps in English and Japanese, and answering our questions.  It is obvious that the staff prides itself on attention to detail. We were impressed with the entire staff- lobby, café, restaurant, housekeeping.  And the bellman at the gate are awesome, always smiling and ready to help.

Dining

As Platinum members we were treated to a wonderful breakfast each morning in the beautiful dining room.  As noted, the choice was a Japanese or Western breakfast.  The Japanese breakfast looked very good, but we ordered the Western-  it included a small salad,  yogurt and fruit, eggs, bacon, ham or sausage, steamed tomato, potato pancakes, wonderful warm, flaky croissants, coffee and juice.

On our first night we had a very nice Kaiseki (multi course tasting menu) at the hotel restaurant.  When we checked in we were given a special menu for $160 that included items like prawns, caviar, Wagyu beef, fish, duck and fois gras. We thought it was very good and would have dined there again except we  wanted to experience some dining adventures. (Note: this was not on the regular menu)

Other Arashiyama dining: We had made special reservations at a Michelin 3 star restaurant in the area (Kitcho- just 2 doors down from the hotel--  this was a crazy splurge for us but one of our best dining experiences ever )  and had also hoped to try Unagi Hirokawa, but it was unfortunately closed.  On the afternoon after we visited the Monkey Park we stumbled into a little local eatery with no English signs and only a partial English menu  (we later found out it was called Hiranoya at 20-5 Tsukuri Michi Cho) Because there were photos on the menu we were able to order delicious plates of Tempura, rice and Soba noodles for just $13 a piece. We were the only Westerners in the place, and although half of the room had traditional Japanese seating, the other half had tables.  I'm sure there are plenty of other small little restaurants with good food in the area.

If you want to dine after 6 pm, you will need to take a cab roundtrip to your restaurant. Since we were aware of this before we came we factored it into our plans, and ended up enjoying the taxi rides as a way to explore the area. We ended up meeting some really nice cab drivers, who, although they didn’t speak English, used their phone apps to chat with us. Though it didn’t click with younger Japanese, the 50 something cab drivers all seemed to be baseball fans who recognized our city (San Diego) because of our baseball team. 

Be prepared if you decide to use taxis that each way will cost somewhere between $25 and $35.  It’s a 30 minute cab ride each way to Gion, for instance.

These are a few of the restaurants we would recommend. 

Gion Uokeya U     Since Unagi Hirokawa was closed we tried Gion U-  the strangest Michelin star restaurant we have ever been to.  The food is amazing  (if you love Unagi as we do) but it’s a funky little place with relaxed service.  Be prepared to sit Japanese style.

Gogyo Ramen    This place specializes in burnt miso ramen.  We had heard that there are ramen lovers who dream of this place and now we understand why.

Hyoto Kyoto   We had never tried shabu-shabu before and this was a fabulous introduction. We tried both the beef and the pork and both were delicious but the house specialty is pork and that is all we would order next time.

We never found our perfect Kyoto sushi place.  We may have been jaded after our stellar experience at Sushi Yasuda in Tokyo.  We enjoyed our beef dinner at Izutsuya, but thought it was a little pricey.

Another “restaurant” we would recommend  (though not for the food) is Gion Hatanaka if you want a really fun geisha (geiko) and maiko experience.  If you could arrange a geisha experience in Gion it would typically cost several thousand dollars. Gion Hatanaka provides an authentic experience with genuine geiko and maiko.  In addition to a beautiful dance and shamisen performance the maikos play fun drinking games with the audience.  We really enjoyed ourselves  (it was the only place in Kyoto where we saw a lot of other Westerners)

If I could change one thing about our stay it would be to do more research on good local restaurants in Arashiyama.  There are ample choices if one is willing to eat a little earlier in the day.  (the hotel warned us and it’s true that Arashiyama restaurant close very early – 5:30 or 6 pm)  We don’t regret venturing out to restaurants in downtown Kyoto, and we had factored the taxi expense into our plans, but after we our positive local discovery,  we probably would have split our dinners between Arashiyama and downtown Kyoto dinners.

Location- Things to Do

My biggest surprise in reading other reviews was the complaint that there is nothing to do in Arashiyama.  I suppose that those preferences are really personal, but we found that we never had time in 8 days to go everywhere we wanted to.  (we did spend 2 full days outside of Arashiyama exploring the major sites)

Here are some of our favorites:

The Sagano Scenic Romantic Train

This was one of the highlights of our trip.  Walking distance  (though you can take a rickshaw) from the hotel is the station where you can purchase tickets for a beautiful train ride along the Hozu River to Kameoka and back.  (if the Hozu River boat ride back hadn’t been closed because the river was higher than usual we would have taken that )  Each way only takes 30 minutes and the fare is 620 yen (about $6) each way.

We seemed to be the only Americans on the train-  it’s very popular with Japanese, Chinese & Korean tourists.   The scenery is lovely, the old fashioned train is relaxing to ride and we even were entertained by a masked performer.  (Do note that the train is closed in January and February)

The Iwatayama Monkey Park  (Monki Paku)

Another highlight.  Right across the Togetsukyo Bridge  (the Kanji character means Bridge of the Passing Moon) is the entrance to the Monkey Park where over 100 Japanese macaques range free and the humans are the ones who enter a cage to feed them.  We had been warned that the hike up the Mountain could be strenuous, but it wasn’t bad for these senior citizens—there are plenty of benches along the way and it’s nice and shady.  The walk will take anywhere from 20-45 minutes.  The park will let you purchase fruit and peanuts to feed the monkeys, which was fun.  We found they much preferred the peanuts.  The bonus of the Monkey Park is the spectacular view at the top.  It would be worth the hike without the monkeys.

The Sagano Bamboo Forest

The first time we went we got a little lost trying to find this on our own and we made the error of going mid-day on a Sunday, when it was a little too crowded.  The best advice is to get up early and visit here before breakfast.  It’s a beautiful, majestic bamboo forest.  The second time we opted for a rickshaw ride which turned out to be worth it, since our rickshaws driver knew all the tricks on capturing panoramic photos.   If you do use Ebisuya (the rickshaw company near the hotel)  we can recommend Akihisa. 

Tenryuji Temple    The hotel is actually on the old Tenryuji Temple grounds.  Tenryuji Temple is an important Zen Buddhist Temple, a UNESCO World Heritage Site and an easy walk from the hotel.  It has a beautiful pond and garden that was designed by a famous Zen master named Muso Soseki in the 14th century.    Admission is only $5.  When we walked through on a Sunday we were able to observe a beautiful Zen ceremony.  My vegetarian friend told me there is a really good vegetarian restaurant on the temple grounds called Shigetsu though we didn’t have a chance to try it.

Gioji Temple    We only made it to two other temples in Arashiyama.  Both were very beautiful and highlights of our trip. We visited them with a local Kyoto guide and traveled to them by car, but they are relatively close to the hotel Gioji is a small Buddhist nunnery with an interesting back story about Gio, a geisha who was jilted by a noble and then retired here as a nun.  There is a gorgeous, tranquil moss garden here. The day we visited it was lightly drizzling, which made it even more magical.

Otagi Nenbutsuji Temple   This was the other little temple in Arashiyama we visited.  It has over a thousand moss covered stone carvings of rakan (one who has reached nirvana).  These are not ancient carvings (although they look very old)  They were created in the 1980s.  Admission here is $3

Saga-Toriimoto Preserved Street  Our guide also took us to this little street with charming little shops, tea houses and restaurants.  We picked up a few of our favorite souvenirs here.

Saga-Arashiyama Shopping Street   This is the main shopping area near the hotel, filled with many small shops and restaurants.  You will find sweets and street food,  ice cream and tea shops, funky  (junky) souvenirs and nicer ones.  We walked around here several times and still felt like we didn’t have time to really explore the area.

Here are the other places we would visit next time:

Okochi Sanso   We really wanted to check out the mountain villa of the old samurai film actor Denjiro Okochi.  The 50 acre grounds and museum are supposed to be beautiful.  (Admission is $10)

Rakushisha   The poet’s hut. This little house was the dwelling of a great haiku poet, Basho.

Jojakkoji Temple  This temple on the slopes of Mt. Ogura is supposed to have amazing views.

Nison-In Temple   Only a 15 minute walk from Tenryuji Temple, this hillside temple is supposed to be worth a visit.

Adashino Nenbutsuji Temple   This Temple has 8000 statues of Buddha and its own bamboo grove.

Hozugawa River Boat Ride    We had really been looking forward to taking this boat ride as our round trip home from the Sagano Train.  Unfortunately it was closed due to rough river conditions.  It’s a 2 hour motorless ride down the rocky river.  It costs $41   We will definitely try it on a future visit.

Private Guide    We were extremely pleased with Takakazu Machi, the local guide we hired to show us the temples, shrines and castles in Kyoto.  He is a licensed guide and driver, speaks perfect English, and is extremely knowledgeable about the area.  Note that he does book up months in advance.

http://privatetour-kyoto.com/ehome.html

Final Thoughts

We understand that a long stay like ours might not be for everyone, but if you want a relaxed stop in your Japan journey, Suiran is a perfect option.  Our understanding is that Arashiyama gets extremely crowded during Sakura season (cherry blossom season- usually April) and November when the fall colors peak.  As much as we would love to see those stunning sights, those are times we would avoid. 

The hotel provides complimentary transport on either arrival or departure.  We took advantage of the free taxi to the Shinkansen at Kyoto Station.  They also handled our luggage transport to Tokyo.

Suiran is one of our favorite visits ever and we plan to return there.