Hotel Altamar Cartagena — Hotel in Cartagena

While the website is clear that the hotel is 15 minutes away from Old Town, it doesn't say that it's located in the middle of nowhere! It's an attractive building dumped in the middle of a dusty street full of motorcycles, semi-trucks and muffler repair shops. Nowhere to walk to.||||The pros:||new attractive looking building||pool||modern room||flat screen tv||air conditioning||very helpful night doorman||||Cons/Annoyances:||-murky pool (didn't trust that it is ever cleaned)||-countless minor things that showed thoughtlessness: no soap dish, so soap just sat in a puddle on the countertop; no trash can at the pool or in the pool bathroom, no knob on the sliding glass shower door, only one towel in the bathroom when it was reserved as a room for two.||-staff that doesn't seem to know what's going on||-every single door is squeaky. Each long hallway is lined with about 20 rooms and each and every time a door is opened, it very loudly squeaks. Makes for a sleepless night. The barking neighborhood dogs don't help either.||||We got to our room and after waiting for a hot half hour for the air conditioning to kick on and make any noticeable difference, we called the front desk. The night doorman came up and said that we just needed to wait longer for it cool down...So, after another 15 minutes, I called him again and said it's not any better. Once he came back and confirmed that it wasn't any cooler he switched us to another room, but he told us that the bathroom sink didn't work. So we had to brush our teeth and wash our face standing at the side of the shower. ||||Our balcony was leaking from above so it was a huge puddle and unusable. Plus the lock on the sliding glass door was broken and wouldn't lock. Normally that wouldn't be a huge issue but there was a connected balcony which anyone could climb over and get into our room. I told a staff person about both the leaking and the broken lock and nothing was done about it until our last morning, when they knocked on our door and said, "You need to move rooms." How about that for customer service? I told him that we were checking out in 2 hours anyway, so we'd put up with a leaky balcony a little while longer. If they'd put any thought into it, they'd have seen our reservation and realized that we'd be checking out soon and not need to propose moving us.||Also, the deadbolt on our room door wouldn't lock properly, therefore, anyone with a master key could come in during the night.||||Breakfast was included in our stay, however the eggs were so doused in butter that I thought I'd ordered a bag of popcorn from the movie theater for breakfast. Our second morning, my husband and I both ordered the same thing (fried eggs) yet mine arrived 15 minutes later than his.||||All in all, it seems like they opened this hotel 6 months too soon. Besides the horrible location, they have a lot going for them, but chose to focus on putting flat screen TVs in the room instead of making sure their bathroom sinks work...

I went to Colombia last week and visited four different cities, in which every hotel was better than the other one, until I arrived to my final destination Cartagena and stayed in Hotel Altamar, then my nightmare began. First, I arrived at night, so tired after a long trip and the front desk guy did not found my reservation. I had to leave my baggage at the lobby and go to eat something while He look for my reservation. An hour after, He still not find it, then He has to do a manual transaction and told me to give me the details the day after in the morning. We went to the room and everything seemed ok! Next morning, I was so excited to get my complimentary breakfast, believe me, you better go to a a cafeteria, the worse breakfast I had ever have in a hotel. We left the hotel to take a tour and put the "Do not disturb in the door." When I got back, all my things were moved and they did enter in the bedroom even thought I asked to not. Then I went to take a shower and they did not leave any towel in the bedroom at all and did not refill or replace the shampoo or conditioner o soup. Now, the beds are ok but you will have a backache after two days. The last and worst is that THEY CHARGE YOU IVA (TAXES) which is illegal for tourist to be charge taxes in Colombia. Yes, you do have the option to request the devolution of these taxes at the airport, but YOU CAN'T BE OBLIGATED TO PAY IVA IF YOU DON'T RESIDE IN COLOMBIA OR HAVE OTHER CITIZENSHIP. Please save yourself having a bad time! Location is not good, very far away from the best places in Cartagena! For the same money or less you can stay in a better hotel and near to the best...

The rooms are confortable and nice, modern. Good walls it's just too bad they put cheap DOORS, the noise of the maid talking come all the time in the room (and the maid are usually all day cleaning something and talking). Doors should be replaced and then you would have really good rooms.||||Very good BED, not the usual hard bad bed with just a cheap blanket. Comfy.||But guess what ? No HOT WATER ! Can't believe this in Colombia ;) And a 4 stars hotel are you kidding me ?...||||Service excellent and very FRIENDLY. Good breakfast. Small swimming pool in a quiet area.||Lift.||Laundry very good (and expensive).||Restaurant is fine, and usefull. Relax.||||And sometimes you can get incredible price here, like 60.000 ! Well not now but in low season.||||Far from center (and way cheaper and quiet also) but if you don't have to go many time in touristic center, well it's just 5000 for moto taxi, and 10-12000 for a taxi. Or buses. Main road so it's very easy, and the staff is here to help so for me it was really not a problem.||||Definitely...