The Joy of Love Hotels

Love hotels are a charming Japanese innovation on tourism and entertainment. Basically, love hotels are designed for lovers as a place to go on a miniature vacation, whether it is a few hours or overnight, and spend time alone together. You can go to one for a 'rest' or for a stay- though you have to wait until 9 or 10 at night to avoid paying an hourly rest fee and only pay the lower stay rate. These hotels can be fantastically imaginative places, with fairy tale, fantasy, theme rooms, or they can be your basic run down hotel, with slightly more interesting television and karaoke machines. The thing is, they're the cheapest way to spend the night in a hotel in Japan.

Most hotels charge per person, which means that a hotel will be at best 7200 yen a PERSON, meaning you'll be paying at least $140/ night at your hotel. Ryokans, Japanese bed and breakfasts, are beautiful, tranquil and traditional places to stay, but they often include gourmet multi-course meals and the nicer they are, the more outrageous the cost- per person.

Alternatively, you can stay at a capsule hotel- a miniature coffin like room with tiny bed, tv, and that's about it- but it's one person to a room, so you're still going to be paying too much. Most don't have rooms for women anyway.

So, Justin and I stay at love hotels on vacation. They have fantastic bath rooms, often with Jacuzzis and spacious showers, nice big two person beds, large tvs, and lots of extras including but not limited to bubble bath and adult vending machines. On our Tohoku we intended to camp for most of the time, and then stay at love hotels for a break.