We were off for a quiet stroll one afternoon and noticed one of the delightful Ananda staff cleaning and polishing the hotel sign... proud of their place of work, and so they should be.. but stepping back a few paces, you notice that the sign is slightly off-skew-.

Can't fault the location, but there are 3 new properties being built right now, including one on either side of the Ananda so there will be some serious competition and for the price we paid per night, you really have to deliver top quality service.(ps no major construction noise issues when we were there, but it was a public holiday,and looks like a lot the structural work has been been done)

Needless to say, room-wise, gorgeous rooms in terms of decor, and didn't have an issue with the bathroom basin in the room, BUT having stayed in 2 rooms, which i'll come to in a minute, all i can say is.. honeymooners take note... there is zero sound insulation in the rooms i stayed in.. In my first room, 108, gorgeous massive room overlooking the small but delightful pool area, there are thin wooden connecting doors into 107- great for families, but you can hear everything on either side, to the point that i turned off my music and just listened to their choice whilst getting ready one night. In my second room, 204, there is not connecting door, and a utility room between this room and the next, and yet behind my room and through a vent in the bathroom, i heard every shower and toilet trip of another room, and at one point could even smell the deodorant spray from one guest being applied..it's a real 3D multi-sensory experience.

Kitchen- it's early days for these guys, but i'll start with the positives- lunch was very good, and other than Salou (a must!) it's the best food i've eaten in Colombia- delicious blue cheese, bacon salad, and the fish of the day with coconut rice was sublime. Breakfast on the hand is a shocker, and only managed it twice in six days- service is all over the place, and tasteless, rubbery omelette of the worst kind. I wanted to get in that kitchen and do it myself but opted of breakfast skipping.

Common areas- got bitten alive- 13 bites in 5 mins is a record even for me, due to stagnant water under the main dining area- management- clean this up, or cover up- totally unnecessary, and is losing you business- why would guests want to sit around early evening, or post dinner, over a mosquito pit?

My biggest issue was the attitude and reaction to a situation i had with my first room- Cartagena is hot and humid, and air-con is a must... room 108 has the additional 'benefit' of under-floor heating due to the pool mechanics, so when your air-con doesn't seem to have an effect on the temperature, on night one i put it down to me being over-tired from no sleep the night before and an early start and crashed for 5 hours.. mentioned this to reception our first morning, and they said they'd have a look- out all day, came back, and turned on air con- 18 degrees set- went to dinner, can back- room temp was warmer than outside, so went to reception, who came back, stood on a stool to reach the high air con system, and was adamant that cold air was blowing- 2 hours later, if i had a thermometer, i'm sure it would have read 35 degrees in there. went back to reception, and poor guy could only say that they'd look into it in the morning.

No sleep now for 3 nights, and not in the best of moods, I decide to let them fix and leave for the day, hoping that they'd sort, and as they proposed, change me to another room if necessary.
On my return, and this is the disappointment, they told us that they'd forgotten that we'd book our 6 night stay in 2 bookings, and that we had to change rooms- no mention of this when we checked in, hence my friends unpacking and hanging up all their clothes for the week. But the apology for having stayed 2 nights in a room with a broken air-con unit and no sleep.... didn't happen, and nor did i get a response from management about some form of compensation.

If we'd been guests for one or two nights, particularly over the holiday season, it could be forgiven, but after 4 more nights there, and not a word of apology from management, or a gesture of any kind, i'm afraid i left this property ultimately disappointed, and my high rating is more in the glow of a few glorious days in Cartagena than about Ananda Hotel Boutique.

Have noticed tripadvisor being used as an apology board- in this case, please come back with action points on what will be done to change some of these issues, so that readers can see that you're taking these comments seriously.

What I Liked Most: The property itself: great location, very well looked after, lovely rooms.

What I Liked Least: For a property costing this much, you expect service to be 5 star standard, and it wasn't.

We stayed for 4 nights over Christmas. It is discretely located in one of the side streets in the middle of the Old City, only a few minutes' walk from wherever you might want to go (in the Old City anyway). There are two swimming pools to choose from, and generally speaking the place was very well maintained. The only criticism in this respect is that the central courtyard has stagnant water which had a nasty habit of attracting mosquitoes. The rooms were spacious and stylish.

The restaurant was in soft-opening mode for lunch and dinner. Nevertheless, the food was great. Everything fell apart at breakfast though. The waiting staff at breakfast do not speak more than a few words of English and we usually found ourselves resorting to Spanish (and my Spanish is lousy). They either didn't know what was breakfast, or could not communicate it in English. Even when we thought we had a breakthrough, it was wrong on 2 of the 4 occasions. Something as simple as a menu would have done the trick. It was pretty quiet over Christmas so I've no idea how they would manage when full. It was filling up on our last day and it was pandemonium. The staff were all polite and trying to be helpful, but considering the price is on a par with the Santa Clara down the road (worth a visit for dinner if you're not staying there), one would expect a similar level of service. To be fair, we brought it to the attention of management and they certainly gave the impression they would start doing something about it.

We loved this hotel, it is charming & well located. Cartagena is HOT & HUMID, the public areas of this hotel are not air conditioned. The rooms are very well air conditioned, (A/C by remote control) large and beautiful. I agree with a previous reviewer about the no privacy in the bathrooms. The beautiful huge shower in our room had a very high ceiling, and when it rained, it rained in the shower....it was lovely, like skinny dipping under a waterfall. :)
The staff did not talk much English, but were very accommodating with big smiles. We chose room service for dinner one night due to the limited A/C in the restaurant. We ordered Club Sandwiches and tea. They called us back and asked if we wanted lemon or milk with the tea. I wanted MILK! We got hamburger with melted mozzarella cut in quarters, we also got a big teapot full of MILK, no water, and tea bags. I thought, oh well, try it, you'll like it. Well I didn't, I thought it was perhaps goat milk!!!!!! Weird!
But we were happy anyway! We are travelers, not tourists, we are used to funny incidents, and they make great fun stories when you come home. Don't ever dwell on the little things, it simply isn't worth it, and the reason you left home was to get away from your routine in the first place. We were at this hotel over a weekend, the regular staff was probably off....and those smiles, and the kindness of the whole staff, you'd forgive them anything. Again, we really loved it here, we would recommend it, and we will always remember it as a special & enchanting place, it really is!!

Well worth the value for the excellent service and the fabulous accommodations. Everybody is so friendly, from the receptionist to the maids and the bartenders, it was real nice to see smiles all day long. The hotel has a great deck on the roof top, we had a fantastic jacuzzi party. I had a room on the 3rd floor, which also has a small comfy deck. The wifi signal was pretty good throughout the hotel. Nice but very basic breakfast (could do better for the room rate). I had dinner in the hotel almost everyday of my stay and I can say the food is real good (try the steak and the ceviche). Overall, I highly recommend it. Wouldn't stay anywhere else in Cartagena.