Hotel Ridge

Hotel Ridge is small, modern luxury ryokan that is in a quite location atop a hill overlooking the Naruto Strait. With just ten rooms total, the property really emphasizes privacy and tranquility for every guest. We chose to stay here after taking a tour of the Naruto Uzushio Whirlpools and Cherry Blossom viewing in Tokushima, and were happy with the decision. Recently renovated in 2019, it's not a "traditional" style ryokan. The interior decor and furnishings are much more Western in style - even in the so-called "Waso" (Japanese-style) rooms, there are no tatami flooring nor do you sleep on a futon, so if you're after an authentic experience, look elsewhere. On the other hand, if you're looking for modern and familiar comfort, then Hotel Ridge just may fit the bill. Our Waso room was stylish and reasonable comfortable. At 60 square meters, it wasn't super spacious, nor was the secondary room particularly useful - it simply served as a small sitting area to enjoy the view of the Naruto Strait. It also would've been nice to have a larger television as well as an honest-to-goodness sofa. In that sense, the room layout was more form over function. The bath in the room is not Onsen; furthermore, you have to fill it with water yourself, which is always a hassle and is an inhibitor of instant gratification. While there is a public (gender-segregated) Onsen bath facility on site, I was surprised by the small size of the bath. Although I was alone when I used the bath, if I was forced to share it with even one other person, it would probably have been too close for comfort. We chose to have our dinner at La Table, the ryokan's French restaurant, since we wanted to break up the consecutive kaiseki dinners that were offered at other ryokans earlier in the trip. The service was professional and sophisticated, the waiter was meticulous in explaining every detail of every dish, and each dish serving was beautiful in presentation. However, I did not find the offerings to be particularly innovative or memorable. It was "good," but "good" is something you'll find just about everywhere in Japan, so in that sense I was hoping for a bit more out of our dining experience at Hotel Ridge. On the plus side, the Japanese breakfast spread was impressive - the sheer variety, as well as the creativeness of some of the dishes - was more in line with what I expected of a top-flight (and expensive) ryokan. The restaurant where breakfast is served is also located within a traditionally charming structure, and our table faced a pretty rock garden. Final nitpick... Given the massive size of the property grounds, it would have been easy for them to build villa-style rooms, rather than have one large, continuous structure with rooms connected to one another. Although I did not hear any sounds from our neighbors (it's very likely that nobody was staying in the adjacent rooms, since the property seemed to be running at low occupancy when we were there), it still would've been