Costa Rica Tourism Officially Upgrades Hotel La Rosa to Three Stars!

Recently, Hotel La Rosa de America underwent a periodic inspection performed by the Government controlled Instituto Costa Rica de Turismo (ICT). This inspection was designed to examine quality of service, safety standards, employee standards, cleanliness, and general maintenance of the property.

Having not been inspected formally for two years, this inspection was quite extensive. After all the work we have put into upgrading cabins, providing handicap accessibility, improving the gardens and stressing customer service, it was gratifying to find out that after the inspection, the ICT would without solicitation, be upgrading our Hotel Star rating from the current 2 Stars, to 3 Stars. We were very surprised by this as we did not formally request a review, nor did we expect to be raised two complete levels! (Hotels are rated in 0.5 increments to a maximum of 5 in Costa Rica).

Furthermore, it was strongly recommended that we petition for a Sustainable Tourism Level (CST) as the inspector indicated that we were already incorporating sufficient activities to rate a possible level 3 sustainability. Currently at the Hotel, we operate new, energy efficient gas appliances and hot water, we have an in depth recycling program, and we reintegrate the majority of waste water back into the garden and property via underground drainage fields invisible to guests! Also, of course, we maintain a low density cabins to garden ratio thus ensuring that guests never feel crowded or having to compete for hotel services. Rarely will you have to wait for anything!! Also, all the water we use to maintain both swimming pool and gardens originates from the Hotel property itself, thus reducing stress on the municipal water system. Guest drinking water however is municipal so as to guarantee it's quality.

All the staff here at Hotel La Rosa feel very proud to have met with such success over the past two economically challenging years. This acknowledgment of our efforts by the officials at the ICT have only served to re-enforce what we already hoped... that we are headed in the right direction to provide our guests whatever they need!

CANADIAN DOLLARS NOW ACCEPTED!!!

HOLA CANADIANS!!! Hotel La Rosa de America now accepts Canadian Dollars! As of 01 January 2011, our Costa Rica airport hotel will accept Canadian dollars as well as US dollars, CR colones, US and Canadian dollar Traveller Cheques, and the credit cards Visa and Mastercard.

Please check HERE for current accomodation rates.

For the past two years here at Hotel La Rosa, we have been seeking a way to process and accept Canadian Dollars. This effort has been undertaken in recognition of the needs and preferences of our many Canadian travellers. We understand the costs and hassles of having to exchange money more times than necessary. This way, Canadian travellers can at least arrive in Costa Rica with familiar currency and not be at the mercy of the non-advantageous Canadian Dollar to Colones Exchange rates or have to change all their funds into USD prior to departure from Canada.

We very much value our Canadian guests, many escaping the cold of the True North, looking for the best climate in the World!!! The owner of Hotel La Rosa, having lived for three years in Yellowknife NT very much has first hand experience of the true meaning of COLD!!!

POLICY:

At this time, the policy of the hotel is to treat Canadian dollars on an equal basis with USD as long as there is no more than a TWO percent difference in the value of each currency. If there is a greater than TWO percent difference, then the posted hotel accomodation and package rates will be converted from US dollars to Canadian dollars and be charged accordingly. Please note the value of the currency is measured at the time of payment, not the time of booking.

Season Two of new Ownership at LA ROSA ends with great success despite Global Economic Recession...

Now that the rains have arrived and the guests have for the most part left Costa Rica until the next high season, the time has come for our San Jose Airport Hotel to start all the large maintenance and improvement projects that have been delayed throughout this busy year. Hotel La Rosa de America has started this maintenance period by going on a major hiring campaign with the result of more than doubling our existing staff! We are proud to be able to do our part in the La Garita community by hiring both skilled and unskilled labour in this time of economic hardship.

Tourism throughout Costa Rica is sharply down both in numbers and in dollars spent per guest. Local newspapers have reported the decrease in tourists as high as 40% and the overall loss in tourist dollars spent as high as 60% over the last year. As predicted, this has had a major impact in all sectors of the industry but especially at the many coastal hotels.

On a positive note, competition brings out many great human qualities and in our opinion, this is occurring throughout Costa Rica with respect to tourism. The result is an ongoing, and in our humble opinion, a much needed revolution in the quality of customer service, in reliability (less Pura Vida/Mañana and more action) and in more reasonable pricing throughout the industry. Though there is significant pain being felt throughout the tourism industry at this time, we feel that once tourism rebounds in Costa Rica, the remaining quality establishments will be in a position to offer vastly better service to guests from around the World.

At Hotel La Rosa de America, we have managed to avoid much of the economic downturn. We are fortunate due to our sunny La Garita, Alajuela location. We are convenient to the one major airport - San Jose's Juan Santa Maria International Airport, and to the many world class attractions all within easy day trips, and our hotel has experienced the busiest year in it's 13 year history. We have received over 50 highly positive guest reports on the popular internet travel site Tripadvisor alone, all of which we are very proud of. We are grateful for all the continued loyalty shown by our many returning guests and for our new guests without whom, we would not be able to consider these new improvement projects.

Not wanting to take our past success for granted, we at La Rosa have taken note of all our customer comments, both the positive and the suggestions for improvement (yes there have been a couple!!) and this Fall, we will be implementing major improvements to our rooms, continuing with our upgrading of electrical throughout the hotel. We will begin switching from electric hot water to gas as much as possible as it is more efficient and better for the environment in Costa Rica. Projects currently underway include upgrading of telephone lines, increasing our high speed internet bandwidth from 1 Meg to 2 Megs, and a complete rewiring of our Cable TV so as to provide a clearer television picture within the rooms.




As always, no maintenance period would be complete without large garden projects. We will be planting a large laurel hedge down the one partially exposed side of the property with the aim of both beautifying the western end of the garden and to provide an even greater sound and privacy barrier for the hotel guests.

A number of other projects are slated for this fall and we will keep everyone up to date through this blog as the projects are completed. For now, as Hotel La Rosa de America enters it's third year of new ownership, we would like to take the opportunity to thank everyone who has stayed with us in the past and to encourage future potential guests to give us a try!