ANA Crown Plaza Appi Kogen guest reviews

Early Feb 2024

Some feedback on Crowne Plaza Hotel:

1. It is a very good 4 star hotel.

2. Rooms were large, clean and very well appointed. Mine faced the hill (which you might have requested?) which was a bonus as great views on Mountains and dawn light.

3. I didn’t go to the Onsen in the hotel preferring to walk to the outdoor onsen. I’ve been to the outdoor onsen before and it is a good one. We had a racoon visit one night and another night where the wind was absolutely wild outside which I loved.

4. Bars and night life was ok but all within the hotel. We had booked 3 dinners that were in restaurants not the buffet. They were excellent.

5. Buffet was excellent but you have to ignore the Chinese going back and back for crab claws and Wagyu steak.

6. They were fully booked and I think that there are 800 rooms so buffets were crowded and sometimes we had to wait.

7. Roger the General Manager came out to sort out the restaurant bookings and he worked hard. Always at the front at meal times. Remembered our names when we walked past. He was Belgian with excellent English and had gown up in Victoria for a while where his father was an engineer.. I managed the lift company at Thredbo and Falls Creek in Australia and you would give him a job any day.

Some feedback on Appi Kogan:

1. You arranged our visit pre-Covid and we really thought Appi was a great destination for groomed runs and off-piste off the double chair at Nishmori.

2. I won’t go back.

3. Nishmori chair is closed and it is supposed to be very expensive cat skiing but the Kassbohrer was broken. So the only way to ski it is to skin up the runs which gets a bit tedious and tiring after a while. I think it has just become another big expensive mass market vanilla ski resort. There are hundreds of them all around the world. Great for many people but not why I go to Japan.

4. Groomed runs were done every night to corduroy.

5. We received some snowfalls but was generally light for Japan at that time of the year. That’s the luck of the season.

6. Only 2 options for lunch at the pink hut on the hill or in the big cafeteria/food hall. Both ok.

Your arrangements were brilliant as always.

Thanks so much.

David

Early Feb 2024

I meant to send our thanks before this!

We had a great time at both Appi and Aomori Springs.
Appi had great piste skiing and good powder on a couple of mornings. Not deep but great quality. Found old ski lift lines and on a windy day, untracked snow under a lift that couldn’t run because of wind at top. Loved the outside Onsen! Great coffee opposite the gondola base. The hotel was fine, pretty busy meal times but plenty of foods to choose from.
Aomori had more tree skiing and so many pistes with lovely snow on the edges. Loved the Ramen house for lunch. Just had to pick a less popular time.Your transport help was perfect. Hotel was fine, food very adequate with less variety but good quality!

Loved our trip, so thanks again.

Cheers
Tony

Late January 2024

We had a lovely stay at Appi Kogan. Skiiing was pretty fabulous, some photos to share and show. Hotel had everything you could want including an onsen, various restaurants which we indulged in as a change from the smorgasbord offering. The Japanese and French restaurants were particularly good and the coffee shop on the slopes. And the ski in ski out aspect suited us well.

Thanks for organising
Julie Morgan

Early Feb 2024

Thanks for booking our accommodation at the ANA Crown plaza. We loved it. Great hotel with fantastic restaurants and our rooms were big after we asked for an upgrade. We will definitely be going back again next year.

Thanks

Greg

Early Jan 2024

Just letting you know that we had another amazing ski holiday. We absolutely loved Appi, had amazing snow and the rooms were so spacious. Our room with the outdoor bath was amazing!! We also loved exploring the smaller resort of Shizukuishi and loved that that both resorts were basically empty!
Thank you again for organising the jumbo taxi transfers. They made our transfers so much easier without having to worry about changing trains/buses etc!!

Janelle

8th February 2023

It was 13 years since we stayed and skiing area did not disappoint again.

The Crown Plaza hotel disappointed.

Old and worn out (furniture in our room). And expensive for what was offered..

Dinners were very pricy buffet 6600 yen per person with less variety than Prince at Shizukuishi. Expensive buffet and nowhere else to go. Alternative restaurants were booked out almost a week ahead, but were very good and better value. We met Australians who got a all inclusive package though you earlier which was better value.

Wifi was extremely poor throughout the complex, though we found the library little better. This was a problem not anticipated in this high tech country.

Onsen was the highlight and we used it every day with the bus ride to it.

Limited information about transport (train trip out of Appi) was provided. We felt captive in the complex without our own vehicle, though the village was nearby, but just too far to walk and explore.

No modern wiring such as USB ports etc.

Lights in room had a dimmer but this did not dim the lights! Harsh lighting.

Restaurants were reasonable quality and variety, but we had to book 5 days ahead as soon as we arrived. Nothing else was available.

There was a sense of being trapped as there were no shuttles around to the village and no footpaths to use either! Village was about 1km away.

Train option was poorly publicized and some staff had no idea about it as an option.

Staff were helpful.

Ski hire was limited choice and , i thought expensive. There should have been weekly or multi day rates, but not available. (For 3x 6 day hire we could have bought brand new full list price skis)

Mountain was good, plenty of terrain. Areas of tree skiing were signed but if one strayed from these, i got shouted at. Some areas could have been open that were shut for unknown reason even though there were publicized as skiing areas and not just weekend lifts.

We skied there 13 years ago and the lifts were better then, but no tree skiing was available

Lot more Aussies there now. Chinese guests were mask disobedient and pushy.

Many Thanks again for arranging the packages, we hope the feedback is useful.

Your information in the emails was very good.

Richard Jasek

31st January 2023

Appi ski resort was great as there was a lot of fresh powder. Many chairs were not running and the front of the mountain was compromised, as apart from the gondola the lifts were slow and uncovered. The back/side of the mountain was sensational and has a covered quad detachable going to wonderful slopes.

We were promoted from the AHA Holiday Inn to the ANA Crown in a much better location and higher standard. The rooms were OK and the food excellent, although the Covid overreach, including having to have plastic gloves on to get buffet food, was over the top.

For our standard of skiing, low advanced it is a good uncrowded resort.

Thomas

15th January 2023

PC3

Crown Plaza Appi Kogen was our first stop before visiting Shizukushi Prince Hotel and Rockwood Hotel in Aomori

We chose the 6 night Early Bird Package with accommodation, breakfast & dinner, lift tickets and snowboard hire.

It was quite easy to get to from Tokyo via the Shinkansen to Morioka and then a 50 minute bus to the hotel.

First impression was of a very classy hotel. Reception staff were very friendly, effiecient and spoke good english.

The room we selected was very spacious with 2 single beds, 2 sofas and a great view of the mountain.

The point of difference between this hotel and others was the choice of food. We selected the meals package and each night we could chose between buffet, Japanese set menu or Korean BBQ set menu. These are all seperate restaurants, so it creates welcome variety every night. You could also order fresh omlettes & eggs cooked in front of you for breakfast, which was a nice touch

For lunch there quite a large food court with your usual Japanese foods, chicken & chips and also indian. There was also a seperate Chinese restaurants open for lunch, but we didn't try it.

I added a snowboard hire package and they had entry level snowboards & excellent Solomon boots. I noticed the rental store at the resort had a better range, but I didnt check with the hotel if I could acccess those boards. I probably should have, but the board I had seemed to be doing the job so I stuck with it.

The hotel is quite spread out and has other facilaties such as a swimming pool, onsen, convience store, gift store with snow gear such as helmets, gloves etc and plenty areas with tables and chairs to relax. It is ski in/out, but it connect to the main resort via a corridor so we usually just walked through the hotel direct to the resort as this was closest to the gondala.

We had amazing snow while we were there and the groomers left a fair amount of snow ungroomed which we loved. But, of course even less grooming would be better. Most of the time we were snowboarding all the way back to the gondala. There was a high black run and tree run that was not acessible because the lift was closed. Some friends said they opened the day after we left and it was amazing. Next time!!

I cant think of anything I didn't like about Appi and would definately go back.

Pete

Mid Feb 2020

It was great!

And thanks so much for your organisation Hisae.

Cheers

John

Late Jan 2019

Appi was great, clean with lots of good facilities.

We enjoyed our stay

Thank you,

Samara and Liam

Late Jan 2019

Was great probably my favourite out of all the resorts we stayed at. Food was amazing, staff great and just the whole set up worked great.

Ebony Tindale

Early January 2017

Appi Grand was excellent. Our rooms in the Tower, although not brand new in their furnishings, were spacious, well appointed, and with great views.

The service was extremely good.

The food in all the restaurants was delicious.

The location of the hotel is ideal for easy and true ski in ski out skiing.

The facilities of the hotel were extensive, and very good for entertainment of children and toddlers.

Thank you again for all your help with the booking.

Regards,
David

Early January 2016

Appi was great!

Thanks very much for great advice !!!

We will be in touch again for another holiday

Cheers

Alasdair

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