Life Tree Ueno

Firstly, the hotel had a superb location. It was near to the Ueno JR train station and near to the Ameyoko area where there are many restaurants. There is a 7-11 just located at Level 1 of the hotel. We loved that there are many drugstores and shopping centres within walking distance from the hotel and most of these are tax-free (minimum spending of about 5000 Yen). The Yamashiroya Toy Store is just a short walk away and because of the proximity to the hotel, we actually visited the store with our child several times (not sure if others would find that an advantage :P ). Ueno park was also within walking distance. A few minutes' walk away is this really great shop (Takeya) where you can find a lot of Japanese tidbits and sweets to bring back as souvenirs. We could walk to Akihabara (17 minutes) from the hotel. Secondly, the hotel is well-maintained. I am not sure how long they have been in service but the rooms are new and clean. It was good to come back to a clean and tidy room at the end of the day. By Tokyo standards, the room we had was rather large. Even with an opened large luggage, we had ample space to walk around. Because of the height of the hotel building, the view from the room is superb and this is truly the highlight for our trip! The hotel had good facilities. There are vending machines, a microwave machine and an ice machine at the hotel lobby for use and the hotel also kindly placed some disposable utensils and cups for use by guests. The Wifi in the room is great. We were in Japan last June and the hotels we stayed in had terrible Wifi connection so we were really pleased that each room in Hotel Lifetree Ueno had their own routers. Finally, the staff at Hotel Lifetree Ueno are very helpful and polite. We were served by a very warm and enthusiastic staff at the reception during our stay and when we met with difficulties (e.g. room key could not work on several occasions), he was always there to provide assistance with a smile.

Breakfast was pretty much the same everyday so if you are staying for a few days, I don't really recommend taking the option with breakfast as you can probably find better food elsewhere. We were also a little disappointed that the hotel did not provide bottled water for our stay.