Stay: Hotel Metropolitan Sendai East

View from our room

My checklist for accommodation in Japan was simple: clean, close to the station and reasonably priced (ideally under $200/night). 

This hotel was one of the first that we booked on Agoda, a few months ahead of our trip. It was within our ideal budget, was located right next to the station and it looked great. I had been keeping an eye on this hotel for a few weeks so as soon as the price dropped quite a bit, we booked it. We booked it for around $400 for 3 nights — which works out to be ~$130/night!

Hotel Metropolitan Sendai East is located on the, you guessed it, east side of Sendai station which is considered relatively quieter than the bustle of downtown Sendai on the west side of the station. Their main hotel (simply called Hotel Metropolitan Sendai) is unsurprisingly located on the west side — and the prices of their rooms reflect that. But there are so many shopping and food options on the east side that we actually spent most of our time here, plus it's a fairly short walk to the other side.  

Kevin was quite proud of his charging station setup

Given how affordable the room, we were actually blown away by how nice the hotel and the actual room was. There was only one picture online of the bed (which is risky) so we had no idea what the bathroom or rest of the room looked like. The room was somehow luxurious and cosy at the same time. 

Included with the room was a 'Handy' phone — a smartphone we could use throughout our stay with unlimited local and international calls and unlimited data (!). We chose not to buy a sim for our trip, so Handy was in fact pretty handy (hehe). 

This hotel has hands down the best amenities offering I have ever seen. There were combs, pink bath powder, cleanser and lotion set (which was actually amazing), headbands and body lotion. 

I'm kicking myself now because I didn't take many photos of the hotel room or the city in general, but I guess it could be argued that it's a good thing that I was too caught up in the moment to do so (but if you ask me, I'm still peeved).

Sendai was my favourite place to visit and this hotel room was so cosy that it was honestly very hard for us to leave. But onwards we had to go...

J

Find me on Instagram, facebook, twitter + bloglovin'.