Zed M.
Yelp
I am providing this negative review with some regret since the Posada de las Flores hotel in Loreto and its facilities and location are excellent. The hotel is clean, decorated with attractive antiques and artifacts, is located centrally in the main town square, is close to the mission and is surrounded by excellent and reasonably priced restaurants with varied cuisine.
On the final day of our stay my son and I went onto the roof deck for breakfast, having locked our room and taken the key with us. We were away from our room perhaps 30-40 minutes and started to pack our belongings to go to the airport on our return. It was at this time that my son noticed that some money was missing from his wallet which he had kept hidden in a compartment within his rucksack. Assuming he may have misplaced it, I suggested he look elsewhere but then noticed that money had also been removed from my wallet, which had not been hidden. Interestingly, the thief had taken all of the high denomination notes from both of our wallets leaving only the smaller bills such that, at a glance, it would appear that nothing was amiss.
We reported the theft to the manager on duty immediately who, much to our surprise, seemed only mildly interested but not really concerned. Interestingly, his English seemed to deteriorate upon the news from being fairly fluent to "no comprendo ingles" - which was very puzzling. We asked how someone could enter the locked room and he indicated that, other than ourselves, only the cleaning maid had a key. We waited for some further response and, in the absence of any action, suggested he talk to the staff to see if any of them could shed light on the situation. He duly called the three staff on duty, closed the door so we could not hear the conversation, and spoke with them for a few minutes. He then indicated that they knew nothing, he knew nothing, nothing could be done and looked at us blankly. After a pregnant pause, I suggested that he may want to inform the police since, in my words, I was sure he would be very worried if there was a criminal on his staff. That at least brought some concern to his face. He indicated the police station was about 3 km away - implying I would have to find my own way there in the 95F degree heat. At that point, I suggested he call the police and ask them to come to the hotel. He called reluctantly and after a few minutes the police arrived, questioned us and the manager, took some notes and made a report. I asked if they could request the video from the surveillance camera which, from our observation, would capture at least the bottom part of the door to our room. They said they could not view it and called the Federales who apparently had the necessary authority. The Federales came, questioned us and the manager, and then left. The video tape was not viewed by the Federales or the manager who had initially told us the field of view was not sufficient to capture the perpetrator entering our room but subsequently changed his story when we challenged his statement to say that it was real time feed only and the monitor was in La Paz - REALLY????
In conclusion, approximately $650 was stolen from two wallets within the space of 30-40 minutes by a person who had key access to our room. We were greeted on the roof patio when we went for breakfast by the manager and the cleaning maid both of whom knew we were the only occupants of our room and therefore that it was vacated for the entire period while we were on the patio giving the thief sufficient time to not only take money from one wallet but also to search through our belongings to find the second hidden wallet that they knew must be present. Finally, there was reluctance by the staff to take action on our complaint. Given these facts it is difficult to not cast aspersions but it would seem to me that you do not need to be Sherlock Holmes to figure this one out.
In way of warning - your movements are being watched, do not leave any valuables in your room unattended and take everything with you, even if you leave for a minute. There are no safes in the rooms but there is one in the lobby. Only the manager has access to this safe - which would narrow down the possibilities if your valuables go missing. I hope this review will save you the disappointment that we felt during our stay in this charming, friendly, little town.