Dai-ichi Hotel Chichibu

We speak no Japanese and hotel staff spoke little English but everything went with min hitches. 1. We arrived via Shinjuku Ikebukuro line which terminated at Seibu-Chichibu station not Chichibu station facing our hotel. Took a 5 min taxi ride as we had luggage. Taxi driver gave us a free ride. 2. Our friend had mistakenly booked a smoking room and we had prepaid, but the hotel manager agreed to change our rooms first going up to check to ensure the room was clean as it was new year and staff had gone for the day. All this time he and front desk kept apologizing for asking us to wait to wait. 3. There was no English tourist info and the next day, the manager surprised us for he had taken the trouble to get us a copy from somewhere. 4. The restaurant attached to hotel was very atmospheric, food was really excellent and good value