Oribana

Oribana onsen hotel is very close to Ogisawa station which is my starting point for the Tateyama Alpine route. We stayed at Oribana for 2 nights, before and after finishing the Tateyama route. Oribana is not located inside the Omachi onsen area. My first impression after arriving at the hotel is not very good since the staff did not come out to help with the luggage from the parking lot. Bu once inside the hotel the standard Japanese service came back finally. Guests have to take off the shoes at the reception and wear the socks throughout the hotel. The staff even cleaned the luggage before bringing them to my room. In the lobby there is music playing the same song in a loop. The staff explained the hotel details in lobby, then led us to our room. The hotel has a not very impressive garden, but with good view of the mountain. I picked a western style room. It is not a very spacious room, may be 10 mats. The room is equipped with both warm air and cool air conditioner. The onsen is not big but with many patrons. The outdoor bath is facing the wild countryside with occasional traffic passing through. The dinner on first night is a little surprise to me. With only Jpy10,800 per person per night, the dinner is really worth more than the price paid for. Every dish is delicious, the local pork, the yuba, the shrimp cake, the grill salted fish, the baked apple, the veggie tempura, all are outstanding. And we have our private dinning room in the restaurant. Unfortunately there is no souvenir shop in the hotel. Again the breakfast is served in the private room, and free coffee is available in the coffee room in the morning. Another surprise is that there are free fresh milk available in the morning near the onsen. The second night dinner we ordered different menu and again scored high.

We stayed one night at Oribana ryokan after our one day Tateyama Kurobe Alpine trip. The ryokan is clean, comfortable. Staff are helpful and friendly. Foods are delicious and portion is more than enough for us. Price is reasonable. We were happy to stay with them.

As we are starting our Alpen route from the opposite end of the crowd, we stayed one night at this very traditional onsen hotel in Omachi. The bus stop to the start of the alpen route is directly across the road which make the starting point more convenience. The hotel offer shuttle bus for the train station but need to book ahead, pick us up exactly on time and it is around 20 mins ride to the hotel. One of the female staff speaks very fluent English and the rest of the team already speak a little as well. (We didn't expect this as this is really in the country side). The onsen is very good and the hotel is not crowed. The dinner and breakfast are wellly prepared and the portion is just right for us, as most of the other onsen hotel that stayed tended to have larger portion. One of the highlight of the dinner is their signature dish - baked apple with cream sauce, very very yummy. Before we go on to Tateyama, we used the courier service to send our luggage back to Osaka and it arrived the day after.

We stayed for one night at the Oribana Ryokan as part of a tour of Japan. The ryokan is very clean, confortable, welcoming and warm. Staff working there is pleasant and friendly, ready to help and to assist. Rooms are very clean and with all amenities. Food is of very good quality, very well prepared and presented. There is no wastern breakfast (apart from coffee).