"The room was new, clean, and tidy. The large public bath with its sauna was great. The service was excellent. The minor drawbacks were that it was a bit far from the convenience store and there weren't many restaurants nearby."

"We stayed in the glamping tents on our trip to see the kantou matsuri. The tent was spacious, even with 3 in the tent. The air conditioning was a life saver as it was very hot outside. We were very close to the bathroom facilities where there were toilets, showers, and kitchen space. The hotel allowed us to use the onsen in the main hotel and there was free gelato cups next to the onsen. The women's onsen was supplied with face wash, lotion, hair brush, dryer etc. We had everything we needed, and it was a great experience."

"The staff who checked us in and served us breakfast were wonderful. However, when we tried to use the bar in the evening, we were disappointed that the staff were constantly chatting with locals and completely ignored us. There was only one other group there and they weren't busy, so it was a shame that they treated us that way intentionally. In the end, it didn't feel like we could order anything, so we gave up and left, but even then, no one came over to us. Even if you book the most expensive room, you get this kind of treatment, and I felt that this hotel doesn't offer service commensurate with the price."

"The hospitality was excellent, and I'm so glad I stayed here! The rooms are clean and the breakfast is delicious."

"The facilities were clean and fashionable and we were able to stay comfortably. The sauna was good, but I felt inconvenient that there was a shower on another floor that could wash my body. The breakfast was delicious and the staff was polite and comfortable!"

"This was my first time staying at this hotel during a trip to Oga Onsenkyo. It felt like a good old-fashioned hot spring hotel, with the hot spring water being just right and the staff all very friendly. I had to cancel dinner due to personal reasons, but the breakfast was very filling and delicious."

"Take the Oga Line from Akita Station to Oga Station. The hotel has a shuttle bus at 2:45 PM, but reservations need to be made two days in advance. Thanks to Ctrip customer service for helping me make the reservation. The journey from Oga Station to the hotel takes about 25 minutes. Oga Onsen-kyo is truly a declining onsen-kyo; there are only a few hotels, practically nothing else! If you don't have a car, choose your hotel carefully. Don't change hotels, otherwise you'll have nowhere to go during the day—don't ask me how I know. The hotel is just an ordinary hotel."

"We chose to stay at Oga Peninsula's Yuinoyado Bettei Tsubaki, an inn located on the coast about 3km from Nyudozaki, which is located at the northwestern tip of the Oga Peninsula. When we entered the inn, we were greeted by a Namahage statue in the lobby in front of the entrance. Our room plan was a normal Japanese-style room, with a slight view of the ocean and Mount Kanpu in the distance. The best thing about this inn is the food. The Oga Peninsula is surrounded by the ocean on three sides, so of course seafood arrives one after another. It's delicious enough in itself, but as dinner progressed, there was a demonstration of Oga's specialty, fisherman's cuisine, "stone-grilled cuisine." It's a soup dish made with seafood caught in Oga and vegetables, and a hot stone is thrown into the bucket. It was a very impressive performance. After the show, the soup was brought to our table, and it was delicious, full of the flavor of seafood and vegetables."

"Teisui is one of the most polarizing properties we've experienced in Japan. On the one hand, the fact that anything even remotely approaching luxury in the Oga Peninsula of Akita Prefecture should be applauded. The views from the rooms are breathtaking. The hazel-colored onsen bath is soothing. Finally, the story behind the perserverance of the Okami (proprietress) is reason enough to root for the ryokan's success. On the other hand, service is uneven, the food is merely "good" and some of the rooms are not ones we'd ever choose to stay in. Net-net: If we were simply staying here as purely a ryokan experience and did not have intimate interactions with the Okami-san, this likely would have been one of the more underwhelming properties that we will have experienced. First, some background about Teisui that we gleaned from our lengthy conversations with the Okami, Emiko Hirabayashi: Teisui was established in 1992, under a different name, as a midrange boutique hotel. As a result of Oga's remoteness and Japan's economic crash, the owners closed up shop shortly thereafter. It wasn't until 2014 that Emiko's husband, who is based in Tokyo and owns various businesses, decided to purchase and revitalize the property at the urging of a business partner. After attempts by three different GMs to turn the fledgling hotel into a profitable enterprise, he was about to give up when, in 2017 his wife Emiko decided to take on the challenge. She was all set to give up when she learned of the declining onsen quantity from a nearby source that she was reliant upon, and the double whammy of COVID all but made it such that Teisui's future as an ongoing business concern was in major doubt. Her husband's encouragement, however, prompted Emiko to make a bold last stand and double down on Teisui. First, she spent almost a million dollars to dig for an onsen source on site - she hit the jackpot; it was not only viable for bathing, the onsen was also of the rare, brown-ish variety. Second, between 2022 and 2024 she spent $5 million to refresh the building's exterior to a more modern appearance and refurbish the lobby, lounge and all guest rooms. While Teisui still is not operationally in the black, Emiko told us it's getting close, and through continued (good) work of mouth and a bit more guests, she has hopes that it can break even within the next few years. All along, Emiko's goal has been to establish Teisui as a beacon of hope for the locals that strive to increase Oga's stature as a tourist destination, and eventually hand it off to someone who shares the same vision. She does intend to return to Tokyo someday, but not until she finishes what she started. Emiko is also involved in various community projects and organizations, including the protection of the local flora and fauna, and hopes to start a cattle ranch on the peninsula as well. As far as Teisui goes, she hopes to further train the staff members into full-fledged "omotenashi" experts (she admits they're n"