Hotel Okura JR Huis Ten Bosch is arguably the premiere hotel that serves the Huis Ten Bosch theme park area. We took a few days off to visit a vast European city-themed park and experience a stay in the resort hotel.
Disclaimer: Our stay at Hotel Okura JR Huis Ten Bosch was hosted but all words, comments and thoughts in this post are our own.
Things we liked:
- Next to Huis Ten Bosch theme park
- Beautiful architecture
- Lots of restaurants to choose from
- Public onsen
Location
The hotel is located just outside the Huis Ten Bosch theme park in Sasebo, Nagasaki. Park visitors travelling by train will know they’ve arrived at their intended location when they see the grand European-styled building of Hotel Okura JR Huis Ten Bosch. We assume a large portion of guests staying are to visit the Huis Ten Bosch theme park so it’s great that the hotel is at the doorstep of the theme park’s entrance and takes a couple of minutes to reach. The train station is just across the bridge so 5 minutes by foot.
Property
The hotel’s architecture is modelled off Amsterdam’s beautiful central train station – having visited Amsterdam ourselves a couple of months prior, we can testify to its likeness though the hotel has a little extra touch of magic to it.
The interior decor of Hotel Okura JR Huis Ten Bosch is also inspired by the Dutch Renaissance. The hotel has a grand and elegant atmosphere, with high ceilings, marble floors and pillars, and three-storey high windows that look out onto the quaint Dutch village surrounded by waterways – the whole scene can only be summarised as picturesque.
Rooms
There are many room types guests can choose from but all are spacious and well-equipped. For our own stay, we spent a night in the Superior Park View Twin and another in the Japanese-style Western-style room.
The Superior Park View Twin undersells itself with its name as the size of the room is huge for a twin. The room also has a private balcony that overlooks the beautiful park view.
The Japanese-style Western-style room decor doesn’t have a balcony but the room itself more than makes up for it with its quintessentially Japanese design. The “Western style” in the name references the fact that there are mattresses and beds in the room.
Restaurants
Having a good selection of restaurants is a must for us when it comes to resort hotels as the selection of food options outside are usually limited. Thankfully, Hotel Okura JR Huis Ten Bosch offers four restaurants and a 12th-floor bar. Camellia is the ground-floor buffet restaurant that serves breakfast, lunch and dinner. We thoroughly enjoyed dining here as there was a wide selection of food and the view you dine too is hard to beat.
We also booked ourselves in for a traditional Japanese dinner at Sakura. The set meal changes depending on the season but the freshness and flavours from each of the dishes were amazing. The dinner at Sakura made it into the top 10 meals we had in Japan during the three months of travel. Other restaurants include the Chinese Toh-Ka-Lin and the teppanyaki OMURAWAN. We finished our stay with a quick visit to Starlight Cruise Bar “Sirius”. They have a wide selection of drinks including local drinks and signature cocktails.
Services and facilities
The hotel has a private pier where boats from Huis Ten Bosch arrive to shuttle guests into the park itself. It’s a lovely and convenient way to enter the theme park and adds a touch of Dutch to the entry experience. Guests who forgot to purchase tickets to the theme park can buy them at the front desk.
A lovely inclusion is a public onsen on the ground floor which is open to guests of the hotel. Both the men’s and women’s sections have a large indoor bath area and an outdoor section. Onsens are a perfect way to relax after a day of exploring and the onsen water here left our skins feeling silky smooth.
Summary
If you’re visiting Huis Ten Bosch Park, there is no better option than Hotel Okura JR Huis Ten Bosch – with tons of food choices and architecture that enhances the Dutch experience.
Hello, we’re Eric and Sarah – a couple of travel photographers and creatives from the UK.
