Hoshinoya Fuji
unscoredno first-hand write-up in the thread
Japan's first luxury glamping resort puts 40 concrete cabins on a slope above Lake Kawaguchi, every one aimed at Fuji, with terrace living and dawn canoeing in place of tatami and kaiseki, which makes it the deliberate opposite of a ryokan. There is no onsen, just a small public bath, and Rakuten guests split on the service, some praising courteous staff and others finding some of it careless.
Scores
Food
Dinner here is not a ryokan kaiseki, and nobody in the thread or among the Rakuten guests has written about the food.
Bath
There is no hot spring. Each cabin has an ordinary bathroom, and the only shared bathing is a small public bath of heated water, so bathing here amounts to a tub, and Rakuten guests say nothing about it.
Service
Rakuten guests split on the service, Hoshinoya's programmed kind built around outings like dawn canoeing and the Cloud Terrace forest lounge. Some describe courteous, wonderful staff who live up to the reputation, while others found some of the staff careless and the stay well short of it. The complaints are about logistics on a resort spread across a slope, where you depend on the staff to book outings and to get between cabin and reception.
Room
The 40 cabins are minimalist concrete boxes, each with a heated open terrace so you can live outdoors in any season, and every one of them faces Fuji. Rakuten guests call the room and the location the best part of a stay.
Place
Architect Rie Azuma set all 40 cabins on a forested slope above Lake Kawaguchi so that every one faces Fuji, and each minimalist concrete cabin has a heated open terrace aimed at the mountain, with a forest lounge called the Cloud Terrace. It was Japan's first luxury glamping resort. Rakuten guests call the location superb and the Fuji view the point of the stay, and KI-NRT calls snow-capped Fuji gorgeous in winter.
Getting there
- Tokyo — 2h, 0 transfers. Reverse of: JR 'Fuji Excursion' Ltd Exp Kawaguchiko→Shinjuku direct (~2h, ~4/day). Miss it → Fujikyu→Ōtsuki + Chūō Ltd Exp = ~2h25, 1 change.
- Kyoto — 4h15, 1 transfer. Round the south side of Fuji rather than back through Tokyo: Fujikyu 'Mishima·Kawaguchiko Liner' bus Kawaguchiko→Mishima (~1h30–1h40, roughly hourly, ¥2,700 — japan-guide, Oct 2025), one change at Mishima, then the Tōkaidō Shinkansen Mishima→Kyoto (~1h51 on a Hikari that calls at Mishima, ~2h27 on the all-stations Kodama — ekitan). ~4h15 door-to-door with the inn shuttle and the change. (Via Tokyo — 'Fuji Excursion'→Shinjuku, cross to Tokyo Station, 'Nozomi'→Kyoto — is ~4h30 and two changes, and the Fuji Excursion runs only ~4/day.)