If you don't require a 5-star experience, this place can offer a reasonably good experience for the price. In this area, you can spend a lot on a nice place or go dirt-cheap and fearing for your safety. Overall, our stay at this hotel was fine. But the manager/owner did rip us off when it came time to check out, charging us in local currency instead of dollars, raising the price and causing us to pay additional foreign exchange charges through our credit card. Other than that, the staff was friendly & helpful, the use of the kayaks was nice (they wouldn't let us borrow the bikes off the grounds, which means they were completely useless). Nice location, if you don't mind a very bumpy ride over the rock road. Oh...did I mention the ants? LOTS of them.

I stayed at the Hotel San Buenaventura for 4 nights in August. I called and got a rate of $50 for a room including breakfast which was better than internet rates that I saw. The hotel is beautiful with simple rooms with Guatemalan rugs, blankets, etc., and lovely well-kept grounds, a pool, hot tub, children's playground and views of the lake with tables, chairs and palapas down by the water. The only drawback is the ugly high-rise next door, but with the beautiful gardens at this hotel it is possible to forget that it is there. The hotel is outside of Pana, next door to the more expensive Hotel Atitlan, so it is ideal for a quiet, restful stay, but only a short 10 quetzales tuk-tuk ride away. The hotel can call for the tuk-tuk and it is there in 10 minutes. I ate breakfast at the hotel and a couple of lunches (no dinners are served) and the food was delicious. All the staff were polite and helpful.
I took the boat to San Juan LaLaguna which is now mentioned in guidebooks, but still retains its traditional appearance with beautiful murals. I remember first visiting when there were no tourists and the children would come up and touch me and try out their English. . Hopefully the increase in tourists is beneficial to this town that suffered so much from hurricane Stan. There are more stores that sell goods from the weaving cooperatives now, artist studios, and a coffee finca that you can visit. i am glad I purchased a traditional painting from Antonio Mendoza years ago. He is one of the better known artists and you can visit his shop on the left up from the boat dock. Find Juan, a tuk-tuk driver who is usually down by the dock, who will give you a tour and then a ride to San Marcos with beautiful views of the lake for 100 quetzales.
Altogether the Buenaventura is a perfect stay especially if you don't have time to stay at one of the smaller villages around the lake, but still want peace and quiet and beautiful lake views.

We were recommended this place by locals who had stayed multiple times here and raved about it. They were very disappointed in how much it's changed this time. We got a 2 BR suite since there were 4 of us. It had 1 room with 2 double beds and 1 room with 2 single beds. 2 full baths which had toilet paper but no soap, shampoo, etc. so bring your own! The unit we used had not apparently been used in a while. One sliding door kept coming off track and wouldn't close. The fridge didn't work, but freezer was fine. It was dusty and had some cobwebs around, water a little rusty at first, but running it cleared up quickly. There were ants in one of the bedrooms, but there was a can of Raid under the sink, another customer must have left. The water heater was not on, and we had no idea until we happened to walk out the front door and notice what looked like a breaker box outside. When we discovered it was the pilot light we had hot water. It would have been nice to be told when we checked in how to turn it on, or better yet, have it turned on for us when we were shown the room. There were some people next door to us who had no problems with the water heater and said their unit was very nice. When we told management what was wrong, they came and cleaned the room and tried to fix the fridge with no luck. We had to use ice packs in the fridge to keep all the food we brought chilled.
The grounds were beautiful and well kept. The private beach was not there. It was underwater since the last hurricane raised the water level. Not sure if it will go back down since it was last year. The pier was also gone. The pool was pretty but had floaties in the shallow part. There were lots of chairs around and lots of plants gave a little privacy for each set of chairs. Breakfast was included, either eggs OR pancakes.

We paid $240 for the 2 BR unit, which was a bit high. The unit had the basics, nothing fancy, not bad but not $240 worth. That was average for other nicer hotels in the area. A 1 BR was $160 and hotel room was $85. Since we wanted a kitchen and to cook for ourselves we were willing to pay extra for a casita with kitchen, but couldn't use it when we didn't have a working fridge to store our food. The living room was spacious, and dining room also. The table was for 4. Kitchen was spacious and basic, but had dishes, cooking pots, coffee maker, etc. 1 sliding door in the living room and 1 in kitchen opened out to the grassy lawn (no patio). We had a pretty view of the lake.

Bottom line, it is fine, as long as you don't need to be spoiled with room service and fancy decor. If you're going to cook for yourself, the casitas are fine, but a little pricey for being so simple. If you want luxury and to be spoiled and have good management, go elsewhere. We found other hotels in the area for the same prices for hotel rooms only, not little houses, but they were nicer. So you have to decide whether you want the roomy casita or the fancier hotel room. The only thing unacceptable at this place was not being able to get assistance when needed. There was nothing in the unit with directions/prices for the phone so when we discovered the fridge/water problem we could not call the desk, and there was no one in the office later in the evening. It was locked up with no door bell, and no way to get hold of a soul until breakfast.

The hotel is near a natural reserve where you can hike, etc. There are gardens next door at the fancy Hotel Atitlan as well. It is just outside of town, where there are lots of places to eat and shop about 1/2 mile or so away.

when you get a gut feeling like something is not right.... trust it

when you think something is too good to be true....it is

when someone speaks to you rudely......you can expect the same treatment the next time they speak to you