Hotel El Establo

The clouds settle into the forest, on an evening at el Establo

Monteverde has deep agricultural roots. Local subsistence farmers were the earliest settlers. In the early 1950’s Quakers from the US purchased a massive tract of undeveloped land, and established dairy farms. Tourism started to develop when the Monteverde Cloudforest Reserve was established in the mid seventies. But the area was still pretty sleepy. I visited in during my first trip to Costa Rica in 1990. There were a couple of simple hotels, and small pension’s. Small, clean, friendly hotels. But nothing exciting.

Everything started to change as more travelers discovered this little jewel of a community. They needed hotels that catered more to what International travelers expected.

The nights get chilly in Monteverde!

We purchased a small home here in 2001. El Establo was well established as a small budget hotel on the main road. It had a nice hillside above it, but it wasn’t a hotel that was on our radar. Just another small Quaker owned hotel. It seemed that it was used mostly by student groups, that had come up to see the reserve.

Fast forward a few years, and they went through a huge expansion. It turns out that the hillside had some of the best views in Monteverde. Over the years it has grown to be the premier luxury hotel in this region. It filled a niche that was needed here.