We spent eleven nights over Christmas and the New Year at the Tropical Park Apartment complex in Callao Salvaje. Overall, we were happy with our stay and we would recommend the place for people who are looking for a nice and affordable accommodation in a less touristic location. Callao Salvaje appears to have a relatively high ratio of residents and nightlife is limited. This in turn, provides for a quiet and peaceful atmosphere, a far cry from the crowded and bustling nearby resorts of Playa de las Americas and Los Cristianos.


What we liked about the place:

Spacious apartment, sleeps two adults in two beds and two more persons one sofabed. Only issue was that only one sheet was provided for the sofabed, which a made us ask for another sheet on several occasions.

Large terrace with an awning, table and four chairs and a drier rack for towels, bathing suits, etc.

Our apartment was kept clean quite nicely. Cleaning service is five times a week and towels get replaced twice per week.

Full kitchen with lots of equipment, including fridge, kettle, microwave, four hotplates and a full oven allowing for baking or preparing frozen pizza.

Quietness in our rooms. The entertainment noise stops before 11pm and we were fortunate to be at quite some distance from the center of the complex where multilingual Bingo, quiz shows and other ‘events’ take place. The apartment complex is next to the ‘main’ street but there was little going on before 8am. Also, we did not hear much from our neighbors.

Two free buffet dinners in the restaurant, one on Christmas Day and one on New Year’s Eve were included in our stay.

Staff was mainly helpful and our small problems were resolved within a short period of time. Not always knowledgeable though but then there is the Google...

Supermarket inside the building was less expensive than expected. Great for last-minute needs or for getting those 8L water canisters without having to haul them across town. The store even opened on holidays for several hours.

Callao Salvaje has some good restaurants which are very reasonably priced. Went to the Indian-Chinese buffet and to the Bodegón Canario and liked both.

Value for money – it was definitely a good deal for the Christmas season.


What we did not like so much:

Even though, we appreciated the quiet location, a beach would be nice to have. Previous reviewers have mentioned that there is a small one being built but as of January 2012, it still does not look like it is going to be finished anytime soon.

A few smaller things that were broken, such as the door lock system needing battery replacement, the inner cover of the safe door that simply fell off (it did not impact safety of the safe contents but it was unsafe because of open contacts with 230V behind the cover) and a few other things (overlapping cabinet doors, towel rack that fell off, ...). It would help if someone would check the apartments regularly and fix those small issues before guests complain. Nothing major though and staff would always get things fixed quickly once they were notified.

We had asked a few days in advance for an apartment in the higher portion of the building but when we arrived, the planning was already fixed and our apartment was on the second floor. It wasn’t too much of a disappointment though as the apartments higher up did not have much better views than we had and at least we did not get an apartment in the basement which would be less desireable for lack of privacy and safety concerns (they had a few burglaries in the past).


Other observations

In order to not get bored, you NEED a rental car or at least get yourself the bus schedule and a plan of the bus network across the island. There is a bus station right next to the hotel, so it is relatively easy to get around by bus. There also is a smaller car rental company less than 100m from the hotel in case you are already in town and want to get a car for a few days. Great location for road trips as you are on TF-1 main highway within 5-10 minutes.

Internet access is expensive at 6€/day, three days are 12€ and a full week is 25€. This was just ok to keep us from looking into mobile 3G alternatives. I wished that more accommodations would offer free internet access, as it is becoming a commodity like water and electricity that people just want to have during their vacation. The WiFi worked fairly well on the terrace side of the apartment but not in the bedroom. Note that no more than two users can be logged in simultaneously which was a slight problem for us with two teenage girls and us parents each using our own devices.

The view from our terrace in the lower portion of the building was not bad but there were no good views of the sea or of the Teide. A small portion of the ocean could be seen when sitting near the guardrail of the terrace and the tip of the Teide became visible when climbing onto the guardrail. Some travel web sites gave us a different impression on the views to expect and the apartment’s homepage speaks about the views from the resort, not from the apartments…


Overall it is a solid four out of five stars and we would definitely go again because the place suited our needs and it was a great value for money.