Month: May 2023

Hotel Review: Palacio de Sal, Uyuni, Bolivia.

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Dan and I stayed a few nights at the Hotel Palacio de Sal in April 2023 on our trip through Bolivia.  We selected this hotel because it is super close to the Uyuni Salt Flats, looked luxurious online, and had a lovely looking pool. This article reviews the hotel and its amenities and food.

Hotel Palacio de Sal, located in the middle of nowhere.

HOTEL PALACIO DE SAL

Located just outside of the Uyuni Salt Flats in literally the middle of nowhere, Hotel Palacio de Sal self-identifies as the “first salt hotel” in the Uyuni Salt Flats. I’m not sure if this is accurate, but it is one of two hotels very close to the salt flats that I could find when booking our accommodation (the other being Hotel De Sal Luna Salada). We settled on Hotel Palacio de Sal for the sole reason that the pool looked nicer in photographs (and the pool did end up being one of my favorite parts of the hotel).

In any case, Hotel Palacio de Sal is located right on the edge of the Uyuni Salt Flats, near absolutely nothing else within an easy walk. Guests are pretty much “stuck” at the hotel unless they leave via car. This was fine, and we figured this going in. The hotel is also alleged “made of salt” from the salt flats. While it’s definitely not totally made of salt, some parts are made of salt, including the roof of our hotel room.  Salt is also featured prevalently throughout the hotel, kind of like sand often is at beach hotels. This was a cool feature!

Here is the hotel. It does indeed look outerspace-ish. The domes are all made of salt!

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Hotel Review: Tabacón Thermal Resort & Spa in La Fortuna, Costa Rica

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As Christmas was essentially cancelled in 2020, Dan and I moved up our planned Costa Rica New Years Eve trip to leave on Christmas day, spending and working a few days in San Jose before moving on to the La Fortuna area, our original NYE destination! You can read about our experience in San Jose here. In La Fortuna, we spent most of our time at the Tabacón Thermal Resort and Spa, which has lovely, amazing thermal pools. This article details our experience at the Tabacón.

Arenal Volcano in La Fortuna, Costa Rica.

For those unfamiliar, La Fortuna is a small, touristy town about a 3 hour drive from San Jose. The centerpiece of La Fortuna is the Arenal volcano, which towers over the town and is quite magnificent on a clear day (which apparently doesn’t happen that often). La Fortuna’s surrounding area also offers lots of adrenaline-fueled jungle activities, including white water rafting, zip lining, and rain forest hikes. However, due to the Arenal Volcano, the area around La Fortuna also has lots of less-adrenaline fueled thermal springs – or water sources naturally heated by the volcano. Since we love a good hot spring, we decided to stay at one of the resorts planned around said hot springs.  We opted for the Tabacón Thermal Resort & Spa because it looked very nice online and is part of the Hyatt hotel network.

THE TABACÓN THERMAL RESORT & SPA

The Tabacón Thermal Resort and Spa is a resort complex located about a 15 minute car ride from downtown La Fortuna.  While you cannot easily walk between the Tabacón and La Fortuna, there is plenty in the Tabacón complex to keep guests busy, from four restaurants, to a lovely pool, a shop, lots of space to walk around, complete with wildlife and perfectly manicured grounds, to the amazing hot springs, and guests will not want for activities to fill the time.  Indeed, guests could stay here for several days without leaving, if that is what you are look for, or simply leave the resort and go into town, making the Tabacón a good choice for may types of travelers.

Welcome to Tabacón Thermal Resort and Spa!

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What Happens When It Rains On An African Safari? 10 Tips To Survive & Thrive!

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Let’s set the scene…your dream safari trip is booked and around the corner, but its forecasted to rain every day. What happens?? Well, I am here to tell you that this exact scenario happened to to me last year thanks to some crazy, unseasonable rainstorms that came out of nowhere the day before we left. We still went forward with the safari and had an absolutely amazing time. So nope, rain will not ruin or cancel your safari, and you should certainly still go! That being said, here are some things you can do to prepare if rain is in your safari forecast based on my personal experience!

1.   First up, if it rains on your safari, you will mostly likely still go forward with the safari drives, with or without a top on the safari vehicle.  So, don’t worry, the safari will not be cancelled! Cancellation is the absolute last thing safari lodges want to do.

Our safari vehicle. It rained later on this safari drive.

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