Japanese Love Hotels Photo Essay

That level of strictness that seems excessive, to me anyway. Instead, the lockers are on the same floor as the showers. which blurs the line between “capsule hotel” and hostel.I stayed at the I stayed at the Takayama Oasis branch, and it was one of the nicest places I stayed in Japan and one of the best beds I’ve ever had. Each pod was like a small room (a room-within-a-room if you will).

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Coming to Japan as a first-time visitor isn’t really about seeing the country – it’s about having an unfamiliar, overwhelming and fascinating place happen to you.

and then re-check in later that day, even if you’re staying multiple days. If you’re planning on staying in an area more than one day, I’d skip Nine Hours just on this aspect.

Conclusion I love hostels, and spend most of the year living in them.

It varies a bit what you find inside, but generally there are shelves and outlets for your electronics, often a small locker for the same (if you want to lock them up during the day), and sometimes there’s a radio or TV.

Sometimes the capsule rooms are co-ed, other times the men and women are separated by room or floor.At least that was my thinking when I booked a love hotel in Tokyo, curious to explore Japan’s unique hotel-by-the-hour phenomenon that makes no secret of what it’s about: this is a place where people go to have sex.At home in London, I’ve booked hotel rooms for the sole purpose of getting some before, but staying in a “love hotel” felt different somehow.The Japanese seem to like higher temperatures than Westerners (or me at least, anyway), so I found it impossible to sleep with the curtain closed and no airflow. With the plastic pods at Nine Hours, any and every noise you make gets broadcast outwards like you’re living in a megaphone, which then bounces along the hard walls of the room.So if someone dropped a phone charger in capsule 1, I could hear it loud and clear in capsule 23.One of the main advantages of a hostel is you get to meet people, which is rather difficult with a capsule hotel similar to Nine Hours.Technically there’s a small lounge on the ground floor, but I didn’t see many people mingling there.At one end of the spectrum are hotels like Nine Hours. I stayed at the one in Kyoto, and it’s the one you see in the photo at the top.Each capsule is a single plastic tube, with indents for shelves and a clock/powerplug unit at the end.To personalise content, tailor and measure ads and provide a safer experience, we use cookies.By tapping on the site, you agree to our use of cookies on and off Facebook.