El Sano Banano Beachside Hotel

We spent 3 nights, Saturday-Tuesday at El Sano Banano in downtown Montezuma. The hotel was conveniently located steps to the beach and on the downtown strip, next to a market and many restaurants. We saw a few different lizards in the outdoor dining area. The in-house restaurant and bar served Tipico style Costa Rican cuisine. The included breakfast was a sit down service with tipico rice and beans, eggs, pancakes, toast, coffee. There was no availability of self serve coffee. We stayed in a room with a window overlooking the street vendors and park. There was one full size bed and one twin on the opposite side. The mattresses, linens and pillows were tolerable. There was an AC wall unit but no window or ventilation, or balcony. Our wet clothes never dried completely. There was a private bathroom with shower with hot water, toilet. The decor of the space was beachy, colorful and quirky, I liked it. Due to the proximity to the downtown area and thin walls we could hear the music and bass from the discotheque all of Saturday night. If you’re planning on staying throughout a weekend, I’d highly recommend bringing earplugs/noise cancellers. Overall it was a pretty good stay but we’d probably consider staying somewhere off of the main street when we visit Montezuma next time. Recommendations for the hotel: -self serve coffee station -more comfortable bedding/pillows -warning about street noise, sale/availability of earplugs -more friendly staff

The good: the hotel is located a short walk from the beach, right in the middle of the tiny town of Montezuma. Through their sister hotel Ylang Ylang, I booked a fantastic birding tour with eagle-eyed Eduardo. It was inexpensive and included breakfast and air conditioning. The not so good: the mattress was quite hard. I thought there might not be hot water, but it was just very slow. The layout is that there's a hallway with side by side rooms. The room had a window that looked out onto the hallway, but no exterior light. There were also noisy neighbors and there was no sound dampening. You have to ask for the wifi password. I tried to walk down the beach to Ylang Ylang for the pool, and maybe it was just me, but it was much more than a 10 minute walk! There is a shady dirt road, but nobody seemed to know how I could get to it.

Unfriendly staff who only care for the customers of the restaurant. Impraticable room with one bed that was not made for people of regular size. Very noisy even in the morning (staff speaking loudly at 6am). Hotel not recommended.

Had a lovely stay at Sano Banano. A lovely little hotel with great charm from their hand painted murals on the walls of the hotel and in the rooms to the great restaurant and bar area. Long standing hotel in Montezuma. Basic hotel rooms but very clean with AC and hot water. No complaints. Sister hotel the Ylang Ylang is a high end hotel with a great pool area at the end of the larger beach in town which you can use as a guest of Sano Banano. Great perk.

Yesterday, service was good, today I woke up early no check on my email and the only place there is an electric outlet tbere were an employee slepping, when I asked the clerk were I can see, he said to me that I have to wait for the employee to wake up. When I was having breakfast I order an extra of butter and jam for my toast, which by tbe way is not included and they took more that 30 min to bring it, I've already finish eating