Description: Casa Alta Vista came pretty close to ruining our stay on Vieques, but our stay was saved by the enjoyable experience of the rest of the island. It is the kind of pretty, independent, small hotel that you really want to like: but the room was really just terrible.
If we'd paid about $30 for the room, then maybe I'd feel differently, but it certainly wasn't worth the price.
Casa Alta Vista is a few blocks off the end of the beach front main street of Esperanza. It's a pretty building with around 3 stories, with a few rooms on each floor and a nice ocean view from it's rooftop.
The main problem with our room was the bugs. I mean, its a tropical island, you expect a few bugs flying around. But we woke up with a lot more bug bites than we went to bed with. And about the first thing we noticed upon entering the room was that there were bloody remains of smushed mosquitoes on the frig and on the walls of the room and bathroom. Not really a nice appealing sight to accompany their grotty bedspreads.
Besides the bugs and cleanliness, the other problem with the room was the noise. OK, it's a rural area, we kind of expected to hear some roosters through the window (the crappy louvre style windows that never really close to seal out noise), and that wasn't the problem. Casa Alta Vista wasn't a big noisy party hotel when we were there, either. But just someone walking into their room down the hall or next door sounds like they are talking in your room. Our neighbors came home at something like midnight,and they weren't really talking loudly, just talking, but they might as well have been talking right at us in our room for all the good the doors did at keeping the sound out. I think the sound was actually somewhat amplified by the tile floors, etc.
Another thing I didn't really care for here is that they really try to nickel and dime you every chance they get: beach towel: $5. Snorkel mask, $5. old bike --- rental fee.
They do have a mini-store in the first floor by the reception desk, and it is nice to have the convenience of that to buy some beer, rum, or chips or something. And they provide coffee and pre-packaged muffins for breakfast, nothing great, but it at least gets you started.
Don't make our mistake --- stay somewhere else!
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