Viajero Huacachina Hostel — Hotel in Ica

Location and overall vibe is great. Beds are comfortable and private rooms with shared bathroom (where we stayed) was good.

I don't mind that it's a party hostel. They adhered to the rules of no noise around 11/12 so the bar closed then and there were no issues with noise from the hostel itself. Problem is their staff, specifically the reception.

First off, very unhelpful when we arrived. We were clearly unsure where to go for check in (unclear signs) and the receptionist just stared at us without assisting us. We realized he was working for the reception when we figured out where to go and he just followed us along.

During check in was even worse -- he seemed to have zero idea what he was doing and had an extremely rude tone. None of the other staff around were helpful nor happy to help either (but they seem to be if it's an all-girl group; we're a couple).

It gets even worse when, on our second night -- there were guests making a ton of noise for about an hour from around 4 am and they didn't do anything about it, even when we went down to complain. There were girls screaming, fighting, crying (I don't know what happened). I went to talk to the guests myself but the staff just didn't seem to care. At all.

The staff was apologetic in the morning (same guy who worked the night) and gave us a discount but the staff needs to get their ducks in order. The bar staff are better/friendlier, but need help with proper customer service skills.

PS: 🍔 Burger at the bar was pretty good butttt the meat had a weird texture, probably because it...

On 5/26/25 I checked in here with my adult kids. I made the reservation on Hotels.com. We quickly checked in to continue with our tour. The first thing missing was the remote control for the AC. I didn’t make anything of it. My mistake. When we returned they were bugs on the bunk beds. Dead bugs smeared on the ceiling. Fresh cobwebs full of dead bugs. That spider was holding shop. They left the bathroom window open. The place is next to a pond. No window screen resulted in a bathroom full of mosquitoes. Called mgmt and after 30 months plus minutes they send housekeeping. They cleaned the webs but for the mosquitoes they used Baygon (Raid for the rest of the world). We’re about to sleep with the fumes. No other room was available. After waiting for the fumes to dissipate and after 8 hrs in the sun with sand on every crevice, I took a shower. No hot water. In fact the only options were cold and colder (somehow). Once I started I pumped the dispenser and it was empty, completely. I finished haphazardly and went to speak with mgmt. big waste of time. It took them 1 hour to bring old hard soap and shampoo in little packets. Mgmt offered to discount my stay but never happened, more empty promises. The staff were teenagers and the night manager was their “Scout leader”. Worse stay ever. Don’t bother going they won’t care. I would have gotten more hospitality at Mos Eisley than at this shop in the desert. I mean...

First of all, location is great and unique, and the rooms are typical Viajero-style-cool, clean etc. But this places vibe was a bit strange and I felt the Viajero should re-evaluate what they want from the hostel. There will be parties and loud music at 3AM. Obviously I woke up for this at 2AM and went to see what was happening. But I didn’t see almost anyone on the common areas, just few passengers but mostly just the staff listening music loud and drinking cocktails. Air most of the visitors had been sleeping like me, so why play music loud when people want to sleep.. Also me and my travel buddy always felt very apologetic when we needed to distract the front desk lady from her computer work to ask something, like a towel or tips for tours or anything.. which is not a vibe we think you shouldn’t get from a receptionist whose most important work is the guests.. But I think with some training/concept clearing the place...