Yilan Accommodation | HOTEL PIN Jiaoxi | Room Review | Facilities | A Design-Savvy Hot Spring Hotel

On this trip to Yilan we decided to spend a night in Jiaoxi. While searching online I came across this fairly new hotel that looked like good value for money, so here's a write-up of our stay.

📜  Information 

• Stay date: 2020-11-01 (double room, one Sunday night)
• Room type: Pin Spring Double Room (breakfast for two included)
• Price: $ 3,640
• Payment: credit cards accepted
• Address: No. 2, Lane 21, Jiankang 2nd St., Jiaoxi Township, Yilan County
• Phone: +88639889090
• Official website: https://jiaoxi.hotel-pin.com/tw/index.php
• Booking site: https://www.booking.com/hotel/tw/pin-wen-lu.xt.html?aid=8003516

HOTEL PIN is the LDC Hotels & Resorts group's first lifestyle-hotel brand, having opened only in July 2019. It's a new hotel built around green and eco-friendly concepts, and its logo is designed after the Taiwan Blue Magpie, Taiwan's most iconic national-treasure bird. If you're not familiar with the LDC group, you may have heard of some of its upscale properties, such as Palais de Chine and The Lalu Sun Moon Lake.

The hotel logo, designed after the Taiwan Blue Magpie

📍 Location

HOTEL PIN Jiaoxi sits near Jiaoxi Hot Spring Park, just a ten-minute walk from Jiaoxi Train Station. Almost everything in the surrounding area is either an upscale or a newly built hotel.

There's plenty of parking, with several lots (I recall seeing P1 through P7), so you don't need to worry about finding a space. That said, they're all outdoor spaces, so if it rains you'll have to walk a stretch outside with an umbrella to reach your room or the lobby.

For most of the lots you can just park and go; only for lot P3 do you need to get a token from the front desk before you drive off, otherwise you won't be able to exit!

The parking token required for lot P3

🏢 Hotel Grounds

HOTEL PIN is split into two buildings, Building 1 and Building 2, with no sky bridge between them, so you have to step outside. Besides guest rooms, Building 1 mainly houses the reception lobby and restaurant, while Building 2 has the recreation area, including the pool, spa, game room and so on.

The reception desk in Building 1

A bright, spacious reception area

Building 2, across the P2 parking lot

The lobby of Building 2 — our stay happened to fall on Halloween

🛏 The Room

This time we stayed in a double room on the top floor (7F) of Building 2. Quite a few online reviews say the rooms are small, but personally I found the space just right — two people don't feel cramped at all, and you can even open two large suitcases fully on the floor.

On the entrance side there's a full-length mirror, a dressing light and an integrated clothes rack, which is handy for getting ready before heading out — and it looks pretty stylish too (?)

The entire room was designed by a Taiwanese design firm; the white steel frame overhead symbolizes a greenhouse, aiming to give guests a sense of "nature and letting go." We don't like beds that are too soft, and HOTEL PIN's beds lean firm, so the firmness suited us nicely.

At the far end by the window is the bathroom and hot spring area, with a hot spring tub and a shower zone.

Jiaoxi's hot springs are sodium bicarbonate springs — clear, odorless water with a pH of around 7. The tub is a good size and you can even take in the view out the window, though our room looked out onto the parking lot and the building opposite, so we basically kept the curtains closed.

The shower area next to the hot spring tub

Basic toiletries

The vanity with a large mirror

One slightly odd thing, though: the bathroom and toilet are separated into wet and dry areas, with the toilet located right by the entrance, a fair distance from the bathroom. Whether that's convenient depends on your habits.

A small toilet right by the entrance

Because HOTEL PIN emphasizes being green and eco-friendly, no single-use amenities are provided (slippers, toothbrushes, bottled water). If you need slippers you can ask for them at the front desk. As for water, the room provides a glass carafe and a kettle, and guests fill up at the elevator lobby themselves!

Right outside the elevator on every floor there's a sparkling water machine dispensing chilled water, room-temperature water and sparkling water. If you want hot water, you fill the kettle yourself and boil it.

Chilled water, room-temperature water and sparkling water on tap

🛴 Other Facilities

Building 2 also has some recreational facilities and a swimming pool. We skipped the pool, but did wander over to the game area in the evening. There's a playroom suitable for little kids, plus basketball arcade machines, a PS4, a Switch and more for everyone — though you need to reserve in advance to play the PS4 or Switch.

A children's playroom, great if you're travelling with kids

🍽 Breakfast

Lastly, a word about breakfast. It's served at the restaurant on the ground floor of Building 1 — the bright, high-ceilinged space to the right of the front desk. The selection is quite generous: congee, salads and bread, as well as Taiwanese options like danzai noodles and savory soy milk. It's definitely a breakfast that will fill you up.

Overall the stay was a pleasant one, and the room was nice and quiet — we didn't hear much noise from poor soundproofing at night.

If I had to nitpick, it rained during our stay, so it would have been better if the parking lots and the passage between Buildings 1 and 2 had some cover.

All in all, though, based on this experience I'd still recommend this hotel.

More Taiwan accommodation and attraction guides

• Taiwan Travel | Taiwan Attractions List
• Taiwan Travel | Taiwan Accommodation List

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