Lola's — Restaurant in Tamarindo

The WORST! Too bad I can’t rate them zero or negative stars!

Upon our arrival we weren’t greeted properly and were told (not asked) to have a seat at a table. We waited at the table to be assisted and didn’t have any staff attend to us, so we went to the bar area to purchase a drink. At this point we greeted one of the male staff who was extremely rude and disrespectful as he made facial expressions as my wife attempted to order a beverage in Spanish. My wife was attempting to order the beverage in Spanish although she is English speaking only. However, I am fluent in Spanish and at this point I stepped in and completed the order as he clearly was bothered by wife’s effort to order in Spanish. His reaction was unacceptable and quite disrespectful as my wife simply was trying to order the beverage and not have a full blown conversation in Spanish.

Upon ordering the male staff submitted our order and walked away and I could hear and understand the comments he was making regarding my wife and I to other staff members in Spanish.

Despite that we paid for our beverages and walked away and had to request to be helped to Check-in about our reservation (which took them a while as we stood around waiting).

Once we were assisted with checking in to get our lounging chairs the services proceeded to get worse as the staff who appeared to be the one helping those in the lounging chairs continuously ignored us. However, he had no problem going to one specific group near us to check-in with them (it appeared he had this misconception that we wouldn’t tip or whatever, which wasn’t the case at all!)

This is by far the WORST experience and customer service I have ever experienced! From staff being inattentive, to staff speaking bad about my wife and I and actively ignoring us!

I am not sure if this restaurant prides themselves on discrimination, as that’s exactly how my wife and I felt as an interracial lesbian couple. We felt discriminated against and disrespected, which is unfortunate as this was our first time at Lola’s and refuse to return to such a place where individuals are looked down upon for...

We went to Lola‘s with great anticipation, after having it highly recommended by other travelers. While the setting is absolutely stunning, and I would highly recommend going there for this alone, the service was just OK, and the food was just OK, and the ability to accommodate gluten-free was surprisingly limited.

Most restaurants in Costa Rica we visited were very happy to accommodate gluten-free needs, already had their menus labeled for gluten-free dishes, readily understood how to navigate gluten issues, and were overall very eager to accommodate us. Lola’s however, seemed more concerned with telling us how gluten-free would make food “bad” even though we order similar dishes with the same modifications all the time, and how it was difficult for them to accommodate gluten-free needs.

I understand that it can be difficult, but if you do a little training of your kitchen staff and your wait staff and read food labels for your ingredients, it’s really not that hard. Perhaps they have had particularly difficult customers that have made them not want to accommodate gluten-free needs, or perhaps their management or ownership just doesn’t care about this.

So, unfortunately, if you’re gluten-free, go to the restaurant across the street, they are very eager and excited to accommodate gluten-free needs and have no problem navigating The challenges associated with this. Their view of the beach is not good there, but their staff are very friendly, and their food is excellent.

Go to Lola‘s for the views, the beach chairs, the drinks (which were awesome!) and if you are not gluten-free, it’s a fine...

In order for you to get great service, you need to be a white tourist. I know I look Latino, but it does not mean that I will not be able to pay as well. I waited for 30 minutes, and suddenly a foreign couple sat next to us, and the server ran to help them, and he literally ignored us. I asked him if he could help us, and he just turned his face and said: “yeah I’ll be back later on”. Like what? You can at least get any drink or apologize. Anyways, after 10 minutes he approached to us, and when he came, he started talking in Spanish to us, like saying that I can only understand his slang way to talk. At the end, started making fun when I ordered a drink and he didn’t want to make anything for us. It took 30 minutes for us to get a drink. I get it, they get money from the tourist, but... hello! I am a tourist as well. He does not know how much money they have or I have. The place is nice, and the drinks, but the worst service.

I’ve been living in Boston for the last 6 year and I decided to invite my American boyfriend to visit Costa Rica and show him the beauty of our people and our beaches, but I guess we are not as light as they want a tourist to be....