Hotel Sails

Hotel Sails is very close to the Osaka Aquarium and the attractions of Tempozan. Rooms are large and well appointed, with very comfortable beds and a nice bathroom area. Check in and out was very smooth and they even kept our bags for a few hours while we did some last minute touring in the area. It’s not the most glamorous location, and not a ton is around it but it has the train station for Osakako right in front of the hotel, which takes you direct to Osaka Castle and other attractions on the city. We got the package that included aquarium tickets, which was great (the aquarium is a must see!) The staff is friendly and helped us with everything we needed. Free breakfast (pastries, juice, coffee etc) is a nice touch. Great place to stay in Osaka, particularly if you’re going to the aquarium and Legoland Discovery. It’s also easy to get around to Universal and the expo site.

We planned for 5 days of Osaka Expo during our 10 nights stay in Osaka and choosing Hotel Sails is the best decision we made. The hotel is a 2 minutes walk to the Osakako station. There is a stair to climb but if elevator is needed, there is one a couple more minutes down at the intersection. Osakako station is merely 2 stops away from Yunoshima station, and the whole trip takes 8 minutes from boarding. On the way back from Yunoshima, we figured out we need to be on the right side of the train to be able to get off the very crowded train easier. There is also a local bus station right in front of the hotel. It may be a good option for travel to the town which we forgot to explore. There are 6 rooms on each floor, and there should be 7 floors with room. All the rooms appear to be about the same size (~40m square) according to the evacuation map on the door. Our room faces the train track on the 8th floor at a corner. There is however no window on the side. The windows could be opened if needed. One of the windows somehow was not shut properly the first couple of nights and when the wind picked up, it create some noise. But I quickly figured that out and was able to close it. We have only 1 bed in the room, which gives us plenty of space for suit cases. There is a nice size desk to work on, with a Dell monitor. I happened to have a HDMI cable to hook up to it but it's only 1920x768 so it's not very useful. There is also a small sofa and a coffee table facing the TV and we like sitting on it to relax. Room cleaning can be done everyday but we only asked for it less than half of the time. They would put a bag outside with 2 bottles of water and newly cleaned towers, and trash bag. Some of the days, we just leave garbage outside for them to pick up. I think this is a very nice arrangement because sometimes we have stuffs laid out and did not have time to tidy them out which would make cleaning very tricky. We met about 6 of the front desks staffs and maybe a couple of the dining room staffs. All of them are extremely friendly. I did not get any of the names, but they was a lady which was always so excited to see us. But not just her, everyone else have been very helpful getting ice for us after 9pm, keeping Amazon packages, etc. We booked our hotel through Citi Travel which is run by Agoda if not mistaken. The price turned out to be cheaper than booking directly with the hotel. It was a pretty last minute decision (about 1 month before) and we are glad we could still get a pretty good deal, which also includes breakfast. It was still slightly higher compare to when I first booked one year ago for a stay in May which I later cancelled because of change of plan. We don't usually pay extra for breakfast when staying in a Japan hotel. There would be too much to miss exploring all the food options outside. But since it is included in the booking, we got to try it some of the days. There is a simple salad bar, machine that makes hot chocolate, coffee, mocha latte, soda machine, full array of Danish pastries and mini donuts. I especially like the curry chicken pastry. The dining room was never crowded. The hotel is also very close to the Tempozan airport limousine bus station. I was worried about how to get to the hotel from KIX and thankfully the hotel staff suggested this option before I arrived. There are Lawson, 7-11 and Family Mart and a small supermarket all within short walking distance. We opted for the Life Supermarket to do grocery shopping like spices, snacks we wanted to bring home. There is a big one on Bentencho station and smaller one on Asashiobashi. There is also a Mega Don Quijote near Bentencho. The laundry machines on the 1st floor are coin or cashless payment operated but no credit card nor ic card are accepted. Things like PayPay or AliPay, TouchnGO are ok. There is an option to extend checkout time from 11 till 1pm. We made use of that for 2000 yen per hour. It was helpful because we got too tired that morning and ended up needed the time to pack and relax before our bus trip to the airport.

Amazing hotel! Room was large, free breakfast (with awesome Costa Coffee), next to the station and service was impeccable! Even though we didn’t ask for our room to be cleaned they were so lovely and considerate, gave us more clean towels and water. We wished every hotel in Japan was this perfect!