Our stay in APA Hotel (Tokyo, Japan)

I'm back! I know I haven't been blogging as much lately, and it's mainly beacuse I've just been enjoying the summer break with the family. We just came back from Brisbane a few weeks ago and we're actually leaving again in a couple of days to celebrate Sabre's 7th birthday! So I've been really busy packing because I'm so OC and I need to fix all the kids outfits and snacks and everything else in between!

Well if you're following me on Instagram, then you might remember me taking a little trip to Tokyo late last year. I've been actually seeing so many people in Japan right now because of cherry blossom season which is giving me total travel envy!

Anyway, if you're planning a trip to Japan soon, I just want to share where me and my friend stayed in Tokyo. My friend was actually the one who booked in an APA Hotel (via Agoda) which is located in Higashi-Shinjuku Kabukicho.

First of all, the APA Hotels have more than 300 branches in Japan. They have so many locations that there was actually another APA Hotel just 2 minutes away from where we stayed! So you really have to check the exact address otherwise you might get lost when looking for it. Ours was in 2-17-7 Kabukicho, Shinjuku, Shinjuku, Tokyo, Japan 160-0021.

The location was actually near the Airbnb me and hubby stayed at before. But it was so funny since even with Google maps and all, I still got lost looking for this place! I actually arrived before my friend since she was coming from Singapore so we had different flights. So I was alone during the first day, and I took the train from the airport. It was supposed to be an easy walk from the station to the hotel but what was supposed to be 15 minutes became 45 minutes LOL! I didn't want to take a cab (cheapskate here) and good thing I had a pocket wi-fi with me so I was able to call hubby. He calmed me down, told me to check Google maps again, and true enough I was just going in the opposite direction ugh! Hassle pa coz I had a huge ass luggage with me. But anyway, found the place and just chalked it up to learning experience. ;p

lobby

Anyway, I knew hotel rooms in Japan are known for being notoriously small. Our Airbnb last time was just right for me and hubby, but this room was tiny haha! As in when you enter, there's the bed and not much else. We had a DOUBLE room which was about P5,500 a night.

But the TV was huge haha! I think it was 40 inches. Not much English channels though. Anyway, the room was so small we could barely exit and enter the room once our luggages were opened since the only place we could put them was the area by the door.

In fairness, the room had everything you would need like a refrigerator, kettle, and blow dryer. And of course free wi-fi!

You could also control everything from this panel on the bed like the lights and airconditioning. Plus points for having lots of outlets for charging our gadgets.

I've said this before, that I can stay in an ugly room as long as the bathrooms are nice. And even if the space was limited, the bathroom was clean and modern. I mean how the hell were they able to fit a bathtub in there?! haha!

Japanese heated, bidet equipped toilet

The body soap, shampoo, and conditioner were Shiseido and they smelled so good and made my hair so soft!

Location wise, it was about a 15 minute walk from the main Shinjuku station. There were also lots of convenience stores and restaurants nearby. But the best thing for me was that there was a Don Quijote just 4 minutes away! We would always stop by here after midnight before going home and go shopping when there weren't that much people anymore.

Anyway, even though our hotel room was small, it was very comfortable. My friend and I were practically crawling over ourselves whenever someone had to go to the bathroom or change clothes, but we wouldn't have it any other way. We probably grew 10x closer being confined in such a small space haha!