Kyoto Ryokan booking - very last minute
 

Hi,

We are currently booked in a hotel in Kyoto. However, I now feel we should experience at least 1 night's stay in a traditional ryokan. We are in Kyoto April 5-10, so it is rather last minute, but I still want to give it a try.

I have made some enquiries via Japanese Guesthouses.

Can you reccommend any other options for secure a booking in a traditional ryokan.

Thanks!

Japanese Guesthouses are great, and they have access to a wider range of properties than just the ones listed on their website. On our first trip to Japan, they booked a ryokan and a temple stay for us but I also needed an inexpensive place in Osaka and they happily proposed and booked a western hotel for us, which proved to be just what we needed.

Hopefully if there's availability, they'll come back to you.

I've just had a quick look on Booking.com and they list quite a lot of ryokans in Kyoto. I picked a random date within your range, the 6th, and there were many available, but you'd need to read through and find one that has the location and amenities and review score that is appropriate.

http://www.ryokancollection.com/eng/

Japanican.com

Aloha!

There is a travel agent in Japan (Kanazawa) who many of us know and have used:
[email protected]

I expect she could help you.

@ Kavey: How do you screen booking.com options for whether they are ryokan or not? I looked at booking.com for the OP's dates in Kyoto and saw only one lodging that was identified as a ryokan; it was in Kobe and wasn't exactly what I would have expected of a ryokan....

Kja
Go to booking.com
Enter date (used 6 April 1 night 2 people)
Type Kyoto as destination and click Search
Down left it shows "Filter by" and under Property Type I click Ryokans and get 19 coming up

The other way is after clicking on Search, at the top where it says Home -> Japan -> Kyoto -> Kyoto -> Search results I click into the last Kyoto and then go am shown a list with tabs for hotels, ryokans, hostels, villas.

I didn't check the actual ryokans in the list but notice that
Gion Maifukan is rated at 9, which is a high rating for booking.com and is well located in Gion.

Also available for that date are
Ryokan Nenrinbo
Ryokan Kinoe
Gion Hatanaka
Izumiya Ryokan
Tougetsu
Ryokan Izuyasu
Masuya Ryokan
Ryokan Inn Yoshida-sanso

and many more, but that gives a good start...

Oh - I think I see what happened. I entered the full range of the OP's dates (5 through 10 April) and searched, but no ryokans came up, so "ryokan" did not appear as an option under "property type". That option does appear if I select just a night or two, when some ryokans are available.

Aah yes, I figured I'd just pick a night to check approximate availability. x

Any luck, KDD?