Gostevoy Dom Arkabay Karlygash — Hotel in Саты

Disappointing! Unrecognisable as the friendly and welcoming place that other reviews seem to be referencing.

Good things: Location on the main road, located about 20 mins from Kaindy or Kolsai Lakes Strong shower with reliable hot water

Bad things: 1 small toilet, 1 shower and 1 small sink for I think around 6 rooms (12 people). Not enough in my opinion Very poor security - no locks on any of the rooms, or the main door to get into the guesthouse building Absolutely awful WiFi! Very rarely working, and very very slow when it was The guesthouse doesn't seem to be just for guests, children at the property are also in and out especially if the WiFi is working, spending time in the communal area, watching videos on their phones, leaving doors open that you get told off for, etc 😂 There were multiple earwigs - in the bathroom and communal space

Probably most strangely, the hostess acted like she was doing us a big favour for having us, and that us being there was really inconveniencing her, and in general came across as very grumpy and rude. Some examples: Agreed breakfast at 9am, but banged on our bedroom doors at 8.45am shouting at us that she needed to go to work Frequently told us off for things like briefly leaving an internal door open, not pressing the toilet flush correctly or hanging our clothes in the wrong place 😅 When we messaged her one evening to let her know the WiFi hadn't been working for a couple of hours, she shouted and said she didn't know why we were accusing her She said we were ungrateful and that she was offended that we hadn't said thank you enough about the room rate she had given us. (The room rate was 10,000 tenge per person per night (£18/€23USD) - so 20,000 tenge for our double room - which doesn't seem good value for money for the small room with shared bathroom. In any case, this was the first price we were offered, and she never suggested at any point that this was a special discounted deal. We also often say thank you in person, especially seeing as it is the only Kazakh we know 😅 and checked back through our messages where we confirmed we had said thank you in written form multiple times!) There are more examples, even things like what time we came home and went to bed caused minor issues 😅

To give her the benefit of the doubt, some of it could have been a culture clash (eg it seemed to me she was always angry and shouting, but her stern expressions and cross tone may not have been intended this way. Also, we can't speak Russian/Kazakh and she can't speak English, so our Google-Translate communications may have translated blunter than she intended). However, we have encountered multiple friendly Kazakh people and this happened a few too many times for me to think it was just bad luck.

It ended up that there were multiple encounters each day that left me feeling very unwelcome, and I was tiptoeing around closing doors, turning off lights, pressing the toilet flush and moving shoes (all that had been left by other guests) so as not to anger her again!

All in all, I didn't recognise this place as the same place described in most of these reviews, with a kind and friendly hostess and a sauna?! (What?!?!) I actually wonder if they meant to review a different place!!!

Looking at some of the pros written in other reviews, they are things like "inside toilet" and "fresh linen", so I also wonder if some of the other guests had wildly low expectations 😅

I definitely wouldn't recommend this place - it is by far the worst place we stayed in 5 weeks in Central Asia. There are plenty of other guesthouses and hotels in Saty, or hotels/cabins/yurt stays down by Kolsai Lake 1 that I would try first.

Context: We are British travellers in our 30s who have spent the past month backpacking in Central Asia (Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan) and have experienced really warm hospitality throughout. I'm taking the time to leave this review as we were influenced to stay here by other good reviews which I think were...

As others have said, it feels a bit like school with the owner constantly shouting at people for breaking her many, strict rules (leaving different doors open or closed, being 1 minute late to breakfast, leaving shoes in the wrong place, etc). We’ve stayed in many places across Kazakhstan and Central Asia and never met a host as needlessly and constantly rude and bullying as this. Everyone is made to feel like they are a huge inconvenience and she is doing them such a big favour letting them stay there. So it is very uncomfortable. The rooms are very small with no towels and no storage, barely big enough for the beds. There is one small bathroom between 12-14 people which is far too little - you’re constantly having to wait. There are no locks on any of the doors, which isn’t great when there are so many people coming in and out at all times. And the wifi was terrible - the worst I’ve seen in Central Asia. It in fact didn’t work at all for two of our days there - but don’t mention it to the host(!), I saw her shout at someone for asking. Definitely avoid this...

Staying here feels a bit like school with the owner constantly shouting at people for breaking her many, strict rules (leaving different doors open or closed, leaving shoes in the wrong place, etc). We’ve stayed in many places across Kazakhstan and Central Asia and never met a host as needlessly and constantly rude and bullying as this. Everyone is made to feel like they are a huge inconvenience and she is doing them such a big favour letting them stay there. So it is very uncomfortable. The rooms are very small with no towels and no storage, barely big enough for the beds. There is one small bathroom between 12-14 people which is far too little - you’re constantly having to wait. There are no locks on any of the doors, which isn’t great when there are so many people coming in and out at all times. And the wifi was terrible - the worst I’ve seen in Central Asia. It in fact didn’t work at all for two of our days there - but don’t mention it to the host(!), I saw her shout at someone for asking. Definitely avoid this...