Hostel Oasis Granada, Granada

Hostel Oasis is a clean, social accommodation but is by no means a rowdy party.

The Location

The location of Hostel Oasis is above average -- it's centrally located and withing walking distance to the downtown core, major attractions, and amenities. However, it's located in a somewhat dodgy area down a small side street -- you should probably take a taxi after dark. As this is a major hostel, the taxi driver will know the location; getting home after a night out is no worry.

Rooms and Bathrooms

The dorm rooms are spacious, large, and cool. They all come with attached bathroom and showers, making a midnight bathroom run easy. There are also communal showers and bathrooms so you never have to wait in line. The rooms and bathrooms are all clean and tidy. The beds are very comfortable and each bed has a locker. The rooms are very large and have multiple fans, making sleeping comfortable.

Common Spaces

Oasis is well named, due to its pool, which is lovely for a dip after a long day exploring the rather hot city. The garden is lined with many hammocks, creating a great place to read a book or catch an afternoon nap. The pool and hammocks area is a great place to cool off, unwind, and meet fellow travelers. Oasis offers speedy Wi-Fi as well as many computers to use. There is a well-equipped kitchen area that contains amenities such as fridge and freezer, stove, and microwave. The hostel has free coffee and tea twenty-four hours a day and does serve a few breakfast options in the morning for a reasonable price. The hostel enforces a strict 11 p.m. quiet time and shuts off the lights. This can make doing things in the night difficult without an external light source but makes a good night sleep a breeze.

Summary

The hostel staff speak both English and Spanish, but are not the most friendly or knowledgeable. Our friends booked a shuttle for a certain price one day, and the next day we decided to join them and got charged a higher price. They accept online reservations for private rooms, but not for dormitories.

Fine hostel, heinous staff

My friends and I had a horrible experience here. On the final night, we had to leave at 3 a.m. to catch a bus. As it was so early, we stayed out until 2:30. When we returned, I stopped at the reception desk while my friends went to pack. I asked the security guard if I could use the phone or if anyone else was working; before he could answer, a boy named Matt came up and confronted me. We'd seen him over the few days we stayed at the hostel -- he was never wearing a uniform and we assumed he was just traveling. I asked him if there was reception at that time and he refused to answer my question -- merely aggressively asking me what the hell I was doing there. Frustrated, I went up to my room to get my backpack. Next thing we know, the one Nicaraguan security guard walked up to our room and demanded that "she come with him now," referring to me. Now pretty upset, I requested I at least get my backpack since we were leaving anyway. Back at reception, we checked out. Matt continued to be aggressive, claiming that he'd immediately answered my initial question about reception and that he'd followed that by asking how he could help me. and when I was rude and "broke through security" that he'd assumed that I was a tramp off the street and sent security after me. When I told my friends that this was incorrect, he started using vulgar language toward me. The security guard was more than happy, despite the fact that I'd "walked in off the street," to charge me for my stay. Due to the staff, I would never recommend this hotel to anyone. They couldn't answer any of our questions -- for example, how to make a booking with TicaBus, or where a restaurant was located. The staff speaks only Spanish, and has difficulty communicating with anyone with anything but perfect pronunciation, in addition to not seeming to know anything about the surrounding area.

Awesome

How chilled and interesting is this place? I met so many characters here. It is true that the hostel can seem a little quiet because there is not a party atmosphere like some other hostels in Mexico but there are plenty of cool, well-traveled people and loads of friends to plan adventures with. The surroundings are stunning, nice frescos, shady palm trees, hammocks everywhere. All this is contained within a large colonial house with a charm and feel that I took to immediately. The hostel is cleaned by a nice old Nicaraguan woman. I tried to chat to her in Spanish but she didn't understand me much, mostly she answered with toothy smiles. She seems to be mopping the floors all the time. I stayed in a dorm and the sheets were clean and folded. I highly recommend that you stay here or you will never know what you are missing out on. Worth the extra money just for the great international guests that I met here and got to be mates with. There is also a pool but it's more for cooling down in and having a splash about, you can't do any serious laps -- it's just too small. I did manage to do four lengths completely underwater though.

Hostel Oasis is located 2 blocks from the central square in Granada, down a street that can look a little lonely at night. From the south side of the parque central, take Calle Real Xalteva heading west (away from the cathedral) and turn left at Calle 1Atravesada, or the 'Circus Circus' casino (really just a room full of slots). The first street on your right will be Calle Estrada (with a blue sign that says 'Oasis'), and about halfway down on the left is the signed doorway The walk from the parque central takes about 5 minutes.

The single doorway off the street opens through a small reception area to a tiled courtyard with a giant, bright mural on one wall, set around an open air garden. The dorm rooms face onto this bright relaxed area, or onto a second open area set around a small, clean swimming pool. This is a fantastic addition to a hostel in this at times brutally hot city, and is one of the reasons for this place being a bit costlier than other Nicaraguan hostels. The building is very flash from top to bottom, with the polished wood roofing and columns and the stone finished walls well built and well maintained.

There are hammocks and cane furniture around the courtyard, which is kept meticulously clean with seemingly hourly moppings. The hostel attracts a mix of travelers, from backpackers in the dorm beds to families and older travelers in the private rooms, making for a relaxed environment, if not the party atmosphere of some hostels. The staff, however, were at times a little aloof, going about their business without much obvious interest in guests, and (as should be expected) many of the staff (but not all) have minimal English, so at least some Spanish is helpful.

The 2 big dorm rooms sleep 12 people each in bunkbeds, and each bunk comes with it's own enormous locker, big enough for the biggest backpack and then some (Top bunks can also use the tops of the lockers as a bedside table!) Shared bathrooms are cleaned regularly, as they can get a little muddy on the floors with pool-wet feet traffic, with cold showers (although the water never gets a chance to really cool down in the heat) and tiled floors.

The hostel boasts a huge (and free) DVD collection, as well as a book exchange (exchange ONLY, apparently - borrowing a book for the duration of a stay is difficult) and drinks for sale. There are also 10 computers with free internet access to all guests. The kitchen serves breakfast from 7.30-10.30, although it's a bit pricey for what it is and NOT included in the price of a bed, along with free tea and coffee all day.

This hostel is recommended for those looking for a place that is a small step above rock-bottom prices, with facilities that more than make up for the extra cordobas.

Good value for the price. We liked the free internet and the beds were pretty decent. The worst part of staying at Hostel Oasis is that the cleaning ladies came in to the dorms at 6:30 a.m. every morning!

I stayed in a private room and all rooms have their prices posted inside. I do not believe they charge different prices depending on your ethnic background. Never looked at their website! The pool was impecable (small pool), the place one of the cleanest I have stayed in all Central America. I got a free 10 minute phone call to Spain, free tea, free internet, free ice, free dvd movie rentals and a real mattress with a locker!!! All of this for $6.90 . The staff was awesome and I felt I was in a true oasis. I highly recommended!!!

Well, the rates for the private rooms as posted on their Web site are quite a bit lower than the REAL prices. I was just at this moment (November 25, 7 a.m., quoted $43 for a single room with TV, private bath, air-conditioning, etc., and their Web site says $35. And do you know they give lower prices to Central Americans? I know this because the woman who entered after me got a Central American rate. I understand Spanish very well, so I heard the whole thing.

The fan over the bed appears very dangerous in the way it sways from side to side in haphazard manner. The photos on the Web site show a visually intriguing place, which it is, but everything is dirty, including the sofa cushions and the pool. It could be splendid, and I think it should be with private rates like what they quoted me! I was awoken at 6:30 a.m. by the maid in the room next door to mine making a noise that sounded like repeated banging of a metal bucket against the wall.

I think this place will be very successful, if only for lack of competition for the "rock-bottom hostel" market. It's a shame they can't be honest about their rates as well.

The Oasis was sweet, not overpriced (if you've been to other places) and the pool was a nice change. It also definitely has one of the coolest laundry rooms I've ever seen.