Ryokan Sawanoya

Our stay in Tokyo was in a traditional Japanese inn, or ryokan.  The Sawanoya was fantastic, and I'd recommend it to anyone, though there might be other places a tiny bit better located for public transit.  The staff were very helpful and accommodating, we had no language issues, and it was clean and reasonably priced.  Breakfast (though Western style) was hearty, yummy and about 300-400 yen (~$4.50).

Our room was very small, and you can see its entirety in these two shots.  The door on the left in K's picture leads to an entryway as long as the width of the room and just wide enough for a sink and shoe rack.   

The futons we slept on over tatami mats were less cushion-y than my camping thermarest, and only after the first two nights did we realize there were extras in the closet.  However, with a double-decker bed on the third night I slept well and didn't wake up because some part of my body or other had fallen asleep, as happened on night two.

Can you see these tiny cranes on the pillows above?

The best part of this place, though also the least convenient, was the onsen, which means hot spring in Japanese.  This word is also used to refer to the bathing facilities and lodgings around the springs.  I'm not positive there was a true spring associated with our ryokan, but the bathing facility was great.  The two rooms on the ground floor were shared by all guests, so that meant waiting for the "occupied" signs to flip to "vacant" on a few occasions.

To take the photo above, I stood in an entry room with a sink and some shelving for your things.  Through a glass wall/door was a showerhead on a very cool timer, a small stool and wash basin, and a large pool of hot water.  This is a pool for soaking and relaxing, not with bubbly massaging jets, and was excellent for rejuvenating tired muscles after walking all day.

While ryokans are hard to come by in big cities these days, I'm glad K exerted her will and convinced me to go this route for our first visit to Japan.  This was a great home base for our trip.