Hostel Cóndor De Los Andes — Hotel in El Chaltén

This hostel was a great choice for our 3 night stay in El Chalten. The hostel offered public and private rooms, free breakfast (two pieces of bread with butter and jams - you can buy eggs and/or cereal for a couple dollars) and wifi (isn't the best and won't really reach the rooms). The hostel also has a kitchen with a lot of dishware and a common fridge with label stickers to keep food marked (a nice touch!). We were able to leave our luggage with the hostel after check out and before our bus out of town which was nice.

Staff

the staff were very nice and helpful with all of our requests/questions. We were treated very kindly. Upon arrival we were allowed to check out our room and then given a thorough explanation of the town how to get to trails. Be prepared to ask about specific trails you plan on doing because they'll know the answers but it's overkill to explain everything to everyone

Location

It is located close to the town center and town entrance yet a short walk from the street with all the main restaurants and a short walk from trailheads. This wasn't an issue at all though, because the town is small and easily walkable and you don't travel to El Chalten if you mind walking an extra 5 minutes to get to a particular restaurant.

Our room

We stayed in a private room with private bath and everything was clean and of good quality. Water pressure and temperature was great; the room heater kept everything at a great temperature. Some negatives: the air in the room became very dry over the course of the night (this could be because of the heater or El Chalten nights in general) and the mattress was very hard. I definitely prefer a softer mattress but this was extreme. I felt well rested in the mornings after our long hikes but if you must have a soft mattress, ask ahead or try a higher end place.

Overall I recommend staying here. Good environment and brings people from...

We've originally planned on staying here one night and then leaving for a 4 day hike, but ended up staying at Condor de los Andes for five nights or so... One reason was El Chaltén itself: my favourite place of six weeks in Argentina and Chile.||||Anyway, about the hostel: The rooms are not very big, but the way the beds are arranged, it appears to be a bit bigger/offers a lot of empty space to pack etc. They have also large lockers to fit in the whole backpacks (incl. tent, sleeping bag, etc.). Clean rooms with private toilet/shower (also clean, no smell or whatsoever you might find in some places...). Also first hostel in a while that has quality furniture (fitted lockers, beds that don't seemt o fall apart).||Kitchen just big enough. Wi-fi is not reliable, but you're in El Chalten, where there's only satellite internet and, thus, it doesn't really work properly anywhere. The biggest down about this is, that the wi-fi is only in the lobby area/common room near the kitchen. Unfortunately, this makes it hard to socialize with other guests: most people leave their room to use the wi-fi and not because they're into talking (guess, if there would be wi-fi in the rooms people would look their stuff up online in the room, and there would be more people willing to socialize in the common areas).||||The staff is incredible: a bunch of young, motivated people working there, they seem to actually care about the guests and greeted us even when we were in town eating out. Could also help us organise our hikes, booked busses that bring us to the starting point of one hike, recommended good restaurants (whether we asked for something simple or something fancy) and always had a smile...

I was prepared to write a 5 star review actually until something happened that ruined my stay. I initially booked on their website for 36 usd per night which ended up being 13,000 ars or 15 usd. I wanted to extend for two more nights so I made another reservation online for 78 usd but since the currency was devalued they charged me 63,000 ars or 80 usd, so 40 usd for a dorm room which is the most I have ever paid for a dorm anywhere in the world. Now instead of adjusting their prices with inflation they chose to charge their foreign customers more than twice for the same room. Do not stay here or any other place in Argentina that charges you in usd because it is illegal and they are doing it to charge you more, despite what they say about the currency fluctuation. And despite charging 40 usd per night they apparently can’t afford hand soap in the bathrooms or a wifi router strong enough to have Wi-Fi upstairs. Maybe you guys could spend some of the extra 50 usd you charged me to buy those things? You could find literally anywhere in town to stay that would be cheaper and honest with their prices, do not stay here. On the bright side they will have plenty of space because no one will want to pay that much for a bed in a dorm, I saw lots of people laughing and walking away after asking...