El Establo Mountain Hotel

Beautiful hotel with wonderful view

The hotel is beautiful! The view is amazing especially from the upper buildings where you can see all the way over the mountains to the the gulf and to guanacoste in the distance. The rooms were very nice and very comfortable beds and very clean. They have their own hiking trails at the top and it was wonderful to hike at our leisure through the cloud forest. They have their own zip line but we did not try it, but it seemed a nice quiet option compared to others. We saw lots of wildlife right there at the lobby and the dinner at the restraint was amazing! We talked about it the rest of our trip! And service in the restaraunt combined with the atmosphere definitely makes it a fine dining experience. The hotel is also a nice distance from town. The amenities are very nice. We would consider staying here again.

The only negatives to this hotel were actually minor ones that would have just made it a more perfect experience overall. The fact that it is in such a large area they use shuttles to take you from one location to another. It is extremely steep and long to walk/hike especially to upper buildings with the beautiful view, so the shuttle is almost mandatory unless you are in excellent shape. They are more than happy to shuttle and most times are timely except there were a couple of times that we needed to wait up to 15 minutes for the shuttle. Otherwise the shuttle service was very good. The breakfast buffet was very nice but the view from the big beautiful window is the staff parking lot and bushes. It was a shame it didn't have a view, but I suppose you can't always have the exceptional view. The family pool/workout area was very nice and under an open canopy. The pool was a somewhat comfortable temperature but it was very cold with the night mountain air blowing in and there was no hot tub which could have made it a nicer experience.

Beautiful get-away from Santa barbara

The view is amazing, room was beautiful with vaulted ceilings; the view from anywhere on the property is amazing; staff was friendly, food was good- no complaints- the resort is on a steep hillside, it's really not an issue ( 40 second drive from the bottom or 3-5 min slow walk to our room 3/4 of the way up the property) -shower is like niagra falls and as hot as you can stand- my wife had no complaints and that is amazing - two thumbs up from Santa barbara ca.

The Grass was too green, too many rainbows in the distance , sky was too blue, Saw too much ocean From our deck/ lanai :) Our girls had too much fun ( 4 and 7 ) - the room was too big Don't hesitate, go. I've stayed in some pretty nice places and this one won't disappoint, despite a few reviews I read before going ( I'm still spoiled living in Santa barbara ca and have some reasonable expectations, my wife on the other hand sets the bar very high and had no complaints which was shocking- even she was shocked when she said it )