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4.5
#1 of 10 hotels in Puerto Limon
Location
Cleanliness
Service
Value
Hotel Playa Westfalia is located on the Caribbean side of Costa Rica. The location allows you easy access to a wide variety of attractions as well as historical sites. At the hotel, you will be greeted by a professional and courteous staff that speaks both Spanish and English. We have a full service open-air beachfront restaurant with both international and local cuisine as well as a full service bar. The pool, located near the restaurant, has a beautiful waterfall as well as a 6 person spa. While enjoying the pool area, you will also have a perfect view of the beach and ocean as well as dozens of palm trees all located just outside the pool and restaurant area.
Star ratings are intended to indicate the general level of features, amenities, and services to expect. This property is classified according to Giata.
HOTEL STYLE
Charming
Mid-range
Languages Spoken
English, Spanish
Location
2 Km South Of The Puerto Limón Airport, Puerto Limon 71001 Costa Rica
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Spent 2 nights in the spacious first floor suite of this nice and clean beach hotel- overlooking the pool. Although close to main street down to Cahuita it´s quiet and peaceful with quite a lot of birds in the garden. Terrace in front of room is roofed- quite important, as we had a lot of rain ;-). Excellent breakfasts and dinners served by friendly staff in open air restaurant close to pool. Beach is great for walks and has good views of harbour of Limon. Watch out for the black vultures in the pool surrounding trees late afternoon and early morning- we loved them. This place definitely deserves more guests- it was far away from being fully booked when we were there. It´s a perfect base for exploring the carribean coast further south.
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Date of stay: December 2013
Value
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Location
Cleanliness
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Sleep Quality
Trip type: Travelled as a couple
Room Tip:Suite has seaview, standard rooms have not
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
Response from MrMichaelFlorida, Owner at Hotel Playa Westfalia
Responded 19 Apr 2014
Sorry for the late reply, but I want to say thank you very much for the great review!
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Hotel Playa Westfalia is a wonderful place to stay and enjoy with your family or partner! It is by far the best hotel in Limón and the management is incredibly nice and professional. The rooms are clean and comfortable, the pool is perfect, and the restaurant is delicious. Not only have I been to this excellent hotel many times over past few years, I GOT MARRIED here in September of 2015!
This is an incredible place to have an event such as a wedding. Diana, the manager, is one of the nicest people I've ever met, and helped make our every wish come true and was attentive to every detail we wanted. She and the other staff accommodated our family from the States incredibly well, making sure everyone was always comfortable and enjoying themselves. It was an incredible and beautiful wedding thanks to Hotel Playa Westfalia!
I couldn't recommend this hotel more! Enjoy your stay! Pura vida! :)
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Date of stay: September 2015
Value
Service
Sleep Quality
Trip type: Travelled with family
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
Wow. What a great hotel. I only got to spend one night at Playa Westfalia, but wish it could have been more! The hotel is just south of the airport and Puerto Limon. You could easily miss it, as we did, as the entrance and sign are obscured by the tree growth along the road. The parking lot is staffed by a security guard 24 hours a day.
Once we parked and headed towards the front desk, we met the first hotel employee. They spoke very little English, which is fine, after all, we are in THEIR country. And to be fair, I only speak a little Spanish. Between their little bit of English, and our little bit of Spanish, we were able to communicate about just about everything we needed. I actually liked the fact that they spoke little English as it was a more authentic Costa Rican feel than at some of the other hotels. In fact, I believe the few other guests we encountered all spoke different languages so it made for an interesting and wonderful international experience.
I am struggling to think of one bad thing to say about this hotel, and I just can't come up with a single thing. We got room four on the second floor, nearest to the parking lot and road. You could hear some road noise. However, it was absolutely nothing that got in the way of us relaxing or getting a good night's sleep. The room was very clean and spacious. It had an air conditioning unit that cooled the room quickly. The bathroom was very large and the shower were warm. There is a refrigerator in the room as well.
By the time we got to the hotel, it was dark and late. We had just flown for six hours and driven another couple through the pouring rain to reach Playa Westfalia, so we figured we would just eat at their restaurant. The food was delicious and prices were fair!
It was lightly raining that night, and the little bit of lightning was far away, so we went for a dip in their beautiful and well maintained pool. It was such a great way to relax and cool down before turning in early so we could go explore Puerto Limon and the Sloth Sanctuary the following morning.
There is beach access directly behind the hotel, a few meters from the pool and restaurant. Their stretch of the beach is well kept and beautiful for a stroll along the beach. You can even see Puerto Limon in the distance to the north. The beach and back side of the hotel are secured by a pack of "wild" dogs. I put the world wild in quotations because they are extremely tame and actually come up looking to be pet and fed. They do not nag you in any way and are very sweet animals. They chase away anybody or anything that doesn't belong.
In the morning, we ate our included breakfast featuring gallo pinto, plantains, and tortillas (they have more Americanized food if you are more picky about your types of food). Check-out was a breeze, and once again, despite neither of us speaking each other's language very well, we had no problem communicating.
This was truly one of the best, most relaxing hotels I have ever stayed at. My only regret is spending only a single night there!
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Date of stay: October 2014
Cleanliness
Service
Sleep Quality
Trip type: Travelled as a couple
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
Response from MrMichaelFlorida, Owner at Hotel Playa Westfalia
Responded 14 Mar 2015
Thanks for the great review. It is greatly appreciated and I will pass along your kind words to my manager and staff! Sincerely, Michael
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The promotion photos are totally misleading. The place is isolated,in a poor area, stripped wrecked cars along the highway , no visible security anywhere. The parking lot was not secure. They are in the process of building a 6 foot chain link fence around the hotel building maybe to prevent access from the grounds and beach area . We knew it was not a safe area and left although we had prepaid . The staff would not refund our money, had to phone a head office that stated we were fabricating our facts although the person had never been to the “resort “ . Fortunately we found a. Reasonable person at Visa who honoured our good record and was able to refund our money and start an investigation of this place and its false advertising.
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Date of stay: January 2020
Value
Cleanliness
Service
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
Response from MICHAEL GRIMES, Owner at Hotel Playa Westfalia
Responded 8 Jul 2021
Hi Gabby; Unfortunately, your arrival was right at the beginning of the Covid 19 pandemic. With everything going on, I instructed my manager to take certain steps to protect the property and see what we could do to keep some kind of income stream during the upcoming time of problems. She was able to find a government agency that needed to remodel their offices in Limon and was willing to lease out the hotel for 1 year. If there was a fence when you were there, then it was for them at their request since they handle domestic violence cases. I am sorry for your idea that the area is unsafe as we haven't had any problems except maybe minor disturbances from our own patrons at our bar. I am curious as to what "Head Office" someone called as that is my only property LOL, and there is no home office and nobody who works for me that has never been to the resort. Are you certain that your review is for the correct hotel? No matter, I am sorry for any inconvenience that you endured and hope that if you ever come back to the area you stop by and check us out "Post-Pandemic".
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After driving for four hours we arrived there past 11am, it was hot and humid, and we were excited to check in, very nice from what we could see from afar and the reviews on TripAdvisor. First, they kept us waiting, then after 10 minutes we were finally greeted by one of the employees,Jonathan Chavarria who came and told us that they had a little problem with the reservations; we had booked (via telephone) with him,2 rooms for 2 people each. And Jonathan confirmed our reservation. Once there he tell us that he made a mistake and there was only one room with a double bed available. He says he tried calling us back but we had given him the wrong number. We obviously didn't give the wrong number, the guy made another mistake and took the wrong number! So then we asked for Management, and we waited...again!!! Finally the manager came, her name Diana Maya. Right off the bat she has an attitude since she states she knew of the situation and of course you can tell she was prepared to deal with us. She states there was a mistake she apologizes and says there is nothing they can do...really? On a Good Friday in CR where there are no other vacancies. We do not know the area, it's our first time in Limon and we asked for her to help us...she stated no nothing to do. She gets absolutely rude and dismissive. We asked if she could hold at least that one room we were going to go try to find something... She said she had no obligation to hold the room to which we replied "you're obviously not the owner, as I'm sure the owner wouldn't treat customers this way". All other reviews stated this place was the best (which is why we chose it) but I notice the reviews are all from Americans and Europeans...so did they treat us this way because we are Costa Ricans?
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Date of stay: April 2015Trip type: Travelled with friends
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
Very nice and friendly staff, however manager was the quite the opposite. Very rude Disrespectful, Unprofessional with no obvious training in customer service. Me and my wife checked in for three nights. unfortunately the rain and avalanches caused the main road to San Jose's Airport to close. Upon explaining the situation the this person (cannot refer to her as a manger) and that we would have to check out one night early in order not to miss our flight back to the USA and be stranded in Limon until the roads reopen because the local news stated that by the next day all roads leading to San jose would closed or un-passable. To which this person replied that that was not her fault or problem and and we would have to pay the full price including the last night even though we were checking out before the check out time on that day. And that is the way it is done all over the world. I said to her i don't agree but we will pay the full amount with no problem. I also let her know that i would be writing a review of our experience to which she replied "do what ever you want to do, and write what ever you want to write but you are paying for the last night" and then hung up the phone. I paid the bill in full and began to take videos of the conditions of their beach, pool, and hotel grounds, in the middle of taking the videos the receptionist came over to me and said he was instructed to return my money for the last night. when i ask why he said that he was instructed to. I said to him that i did not want the money back, he had this terrified look on his face and begged for me to take the money back. I explained to him that the money was never the issue, sometimes all a customer wants is to be heard and understood, and that person did neither. I finally took the money back and divided it up and gave it to the staff as tips because they were great despite of this person "manager". Ps the next day while in San Jose we got news that the entire town of Limon was flooded and under more than a foot of water. As long as this person continues to work for this Hotel they will continue to lose customers, I have read several other reviews were they praise the staff and are very dissatisfied with this person. I love to vacation in costa rica and at the end of vacation take a few days to visit my grandmother in Limon. I would never stay there again as long as this person works there.
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Date of stay: July 2015
Cleanliness
Service
Sleep Quality
Trip type: Travelled as a couple
Room Tip:Manager sucks
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
Response from HotelPlayaWestfalia, Gerente at Hotel Playa Westfalia
Responded 17 Aug 2015
Yes, I can imagine how frustrating can be staying in a place that most of the time was raining. Just for records there are two roads to come back and ford to Limon and one of them was always open. Anyway I remember the person who hung up the phone was you, however not paying attention of your roughness I decided not to charge the room for the nights that you were canceling. Also any of my staff remember you gave them money "tip" as you said in your review, that would be very nice of you do after being very rude to them too. People who make reservations in small hotels do not realize that they are making a commitment to us for a room, and in addition to that we are also making a commitment to them to reserve the room for them. For example if a room we booked and confirmed it to you, after another person comes and offers us more money for the same room, it would be easy for the hotel to cancel your reservation and rent it out to the other person for a better deal. This could be done before or even during your stay. But of course this is something we would never occur to our customers. For this reason we expect customers to have the same respect for us. As for your comments about our hotel and service, I think you realized that was constantly raining and it's very difficult for us to maintain perfect the common areas in that conditions.
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If at all possible rent a car. Its the only way to see the country. Driving here is not for the faint of heart however, you need to be a really good driver to move with the traffic.. We rented from EuropCar in San Jose where a shuttle was provided to the car company.
Get familiar with a roadmap if possible before you come as none of the roads have names or even numbers. Very difficult to navigate in the city of San Jose.
Once we figured out how to get out of the city it was a straight shot to Limon as there is only one road.
From the moment we arrive Diana Mayo the manager made us feel right at home after a long ride. You wont find this kind of personal touch in most other hotels. In fact on this trip we hit Limon, Aronel, Monteverde, Jaco, and San Jose in that order. While all of the stays we had at various hotels were great I must say Diana and her team of hotel professionals were the best! The hotels proximity to the Cahuita National Park makes it a great strategic stopover. The hotel is right on the beach, grounds are growing pineapple and coconut palm trees with various other indigenous plant species. We saw monkeys playing in the trees!
Now for the bad....People will tell you "dont go to Limon" I am telliing you "GO TO LIMON'". It is a must on your travel itinerary if you want to experience the full culture of this country. I traveled with my son and another friend. We drove all over downtown Limon. Stopped at all the local stores and shops. The people are the friendliest you will find, though poor. They have more than both you and I because they have found an enduring happiness in the midst of very difficult circumstances. So for me the "bad" of all of this is that people who tell you dont go are really the ones who need to go the most. They are the ones with the "stereotype" problem.
GO AND VISIT THE PLAYA WESTFALIA!
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Date of stay: July 2010
Value
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Location
Cleanliness
Service
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Trip type: Travelled with family
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
Response from MrMichaelFlorida, Owner at Hotel Playa Westfalia
Responded 11 Jul 2013
I am sorry for such a late reply. For some reason, I was not notified of some of my reviews, yours being one of them. I am so happy you enjoyed your stay at our hotel and hope you can come again in the future!
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What a wonderful place to stay!! I had business in Puerto Limon for one day and it was my first time in that area. Like most savvy travelers, I researched Trip Advisor to get the opinions of others. Quite honestly, there aren’t many hotels in that area, most are farther out of the city. I also checked out the hotel’s website and found it warm and friendly. I emailed with Jorge, the GM, before I arrived and his response was immediate with great detail and other information. I checked out the photos submitted by others and was very impressed with the appearance of the hotel and grounds. I was not disappointed! When I arrived, Jorge was extremely helpful and even let me use his laptop to check emails, etc. At the bar, I met Carlos the bartender and Flor the chef. Both with limited English, but enough to answer questions and make recommendations. They made sure that everyone around was served promptly and with a smile. I was there for two nights and had dinner there both nights. The Red Snapper and Shrimp with Rice are both great dishes. The local beer, Imperial, is also quite tasty. The food and beverages are all very reasonably priced. Breakfasts are unique, again very tasty and filling. The restaurant and bar areas overlap each other, but in a grand fashion. I met several families there, from Alaska to Maryland to New Orleans and we all just merged into one big happy group in the evenings. Apparently this happens here all the time. The hotel is actually very beautiful. The rooms are very clean, spacious and comfortable. Fresh linens everyday, a large shower and amenities provided. I guess the only problem I had was that the TV only had Spanish stations and I have a limited vocabulary here. But, it wasn’t a real bad deal, I got caught up on my reading and that was very relaxing. The rooms have their own outside sitting area and contributed to that relaxing time. There are a couple of pets of the hotel that can be found entertaining the guests, I think I counted three well trained and obedient dogs on the property. The pool and beach, although I had no time for either, were gorgeous. The large pool had a large fountain flowing into it and there’s hot tub adjacent to the pool. The beach and hotel was separated by stunning palm trees. They make for beautiful pictures. Overall a great experience and would definitely stay here again if I have reason to be in Puerto Limon!!
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Date of stay: January 2010
Value
Rooms
Location
Cleanliness
Service
Trip type: Travelled on business
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
Response from MrMichaelFlorida, Owner at Hotel Playa Westfalia
Responded 11 Jul 2013
I am sorry for such a late reply. For some reason, I was not notified of some of my reviews, yours being one of them. I am so happy you enjoyed your stay at our hotel and hope you can come again in the future!
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We found this place after searching and getting lost in Puerto Limon. This is a great little place. The staff are wonderful and so very friendly. There is a lady named Flor who works the kitchen and registration desk who is so kind and sweet. We ate supper in the restaurant and enjoyed the house specialty which is a fish fillet (sea bass) covered with shrimp, and it was so delicious that we ate it 2 nights in a row. I have included a photo but it doesn’t do it justice! We swam in the ocean which is accessible by the dining area, you can hear the waves crashing all night long. We are from Canada, and I would love to return here. I highly recommend this little piece of paradise 😄
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Date of stay: August 2018Trip type: Travelled as a couple
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
Folks----look at the last few reviews--see a common theme??? I live in Costa Rica and travel a lot. I know this place since it was built. WAS very very nice---beautiful tile work way out of the ordinary. Right on the beach and was perfect. WAS is the catch word here. Good Lord they charged us 112 dollars per room--more than what we discussed when making the reservation. The rooms STINK! So much mold it hurt to breath---the pillows were black with mold and disgusting and the sheets not washed. So it's nine o'clock and we have guests with a 4 year old and we had been on the road all day--TIRED! My wife gets the manager to the room and he was just plain nasty, rude and has NO CLUE what customer service is. He was so nasty to my wife he is lucky I did not knock him out and tells us to leave and go find a hotel and he will refund our money. Yeah right--nine o'clock and needing sleep and with 4 year old go out hotel hunting. He said he has no access to clean sheets and pillows. Well my wife took his photo, read him the riot act (she is Costa Rican) and he did find us another room that was acceptable except for the fact the toilet did not flush! So---trust me, sleep in your car or under some leaves you will be happier---avoid this place at all costs unless they figure out the nasty jerk manager needs to be fired and close the place and clean for a week and get rid of the mold. Yes it is at the beach and it is hard but to expect people to lay on and breath black mold then abuse you with his nastiness is not worth 10 bucks let alone 112!
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Date of stay: November 2017
Location
Cleanliness
Service
Trip type: Travelled with friends
Room Tip:Anywhere but here
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
Good morning..
This is a black sand beach very private and lonely, depends on the time of the year you can swim no for snorkeling, there are not umbrellas or chairs on the beach.
Best regards!!
There are more places to choose from in the Puerto Limon area.
PRICE RANGE
$112 - $150 (Based on Average Rates for a Standard Room)
ALSO KNOWN AS
playa westfalia hotel
LOCATION
Costa RicaProvince of LimonPuerto Limon
NUMBER OF ROOMS
10
Prices are provided by our partners, and reflect total costs of the stay, including all taxes and fees known to our partners. Please see our partners for more details.
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Yes, it offers wheelchair access, reduced mobility rooms, and facilities for disabled guests. For specific enquiries, we recommend calling ahead to confirm.
