Hostal Balmaceda La Serena — Hotel in La Serena

I really wanted to write a good review about this place and on a whole it was a good place to stay (especially in a town where there is nothing to do!) ||The young man on reception was really helpful and spoke excellent English! The room was nice and had a TV with its own bathroom. The wifi was excellent which was a bonus! The kitchen and breakfast area was also really nice and the breakfast was decent. ||...However, for most travellers La Serena is just a stop off point on the way up North! Therefore, it is likely a lot of people will be waiting around in the day to get a night bus. We thought, as is the case in most hostels, we would be allowed to leave our bags there while we waited for our bus. After trying to kill time as best we could, we stopped at the hostel to quickly use the bathroom at 5pm.The young man on reception then came to ask us if it was our bags in reception as the manager said we must take them immediately! We explained our bus was not till 9 and could we keep them there a little longer but the manager said we had to take them straight away! The young man was very apologetic and I think he could see his manager was being unreasonable. I really don't see what difference it would of made to the manager for our bags to be there a little longer or at least till reception closed! Perhaps he could have spoke to us himself instead of getting the receptionist to do it for him! ||Let down after...

We had a very pleasant 4 night stay here, but could not say that it was perfect. ||Firstly, we would definitely classify this as a small apartment complex rather than a hostel. That is no bad thing necessarily. The room itself was amongst the best we have had on our travels in South America - spacious, well equipped and clean. The apartments are located within walking distance of the town centre and the bus station, which is always handy. ||The apartments at the back appear to be work in progress, with more building to follow at the back, which is next to the shared kitchen. This lends a slightly incomplete feeling to the place although is not at all intrusive. The kitchen itself is adequate and clean, our only complaint would be the lack of any remotely sharp knives! When we stayed it was also rather cold on the evenings and mornings, and we were unable to enjoy the lobby/breakfast area which is kind of simultaneously inside and outside. The breakfast itself was like a snack box, something like you might get on a long distance bus journey in the morning. We weren't sure if this was a temporary measure until the apartments are finished. |We would definitely recommend these apartments, and think that once they are complete they will be a really great...

This is a jumble of a hostal. The old part has 5 rooms that are two story with upstairs bedrooms and own kitchens and ensuite bathrooms. The new part is an amateur make-shift half-finished addition. There are gaps between the frames and doors, the tiling in the shower does not slant to the drain, there are no windows (except room 9) to the outside only small skylights. We arrived very early and the disgruntled still-sleeping woman was not very happy to hear us banging on the door, although she allowed us to store our luggage and use the wifi until check-in. She seemed to be able to understand our English yet refused to speak it, instead she wrote her responses in English with perfect grammar. The man attendant had passable English and was extremely helpful. The upstairs rooms had plasterboard only wall dividers and a good sleep was dependent upon not have immature Germans chatting and laughing until 3am! We have mixed feelings about this hostal but it was a good price relative to other hostals in La Serena and the location at the edge of the historic...