The wonderfully helpful staff at the family-run Casa de Los Frailes Hotel made our trip to Oaxaca a great experience. The hotel is excellently located a few steps from the Botanical Gardens and Santo Domingo. The rooms are kept very clean as is the entire facility, but the friendliness of the family and staff is what sets this hotel above most.

We traveled from the US and arrived at the hotel around midnight. The person there at the front desk was very nice but not helpful. We had booked three rooms through Booking.com and had our confirmation email with us. Initially I thought we had paid in advance, which thank goodness we had not, so once I found my email and got that straight we said well we will pay for the rooms now. The next issue was they no longer take credit cards even though it was posted that they did. So we figured out that we had enough to pay cash. So when we said we could do that the truth finally came out. They did not have our rooms and were not going to honor our reservations. They had no intention of doing so from the very begining but were just looking for a way to put the problem on us. We found out that the hotel has recently changed hands and has a new owner. Hopefully he will quickly go out of business so someone honest will run this hotel again. Be wary of any reservations you have with this hotel and I would not recommend paying in advance as he may not honor them. So now this left us without a hotel for the next week at 1am in the morning and needing three rooms. They offered no help what so ever as far as suggestions or ideas. No one was rude, us or the manager, he was just useless and not helpful. Language was not an issue as Spanish is my wifes first language. Do not stay in this hotel unless you are there and know for sure they are going to have rooms. Oaxca City and surrounding area is wonderful and a great place. We will return. Thanks to the Holiday Inn Express for providing great service with no reservations and giving us a fair price on our rooms at such a late hour.