Fodor's Expert Review Aguada Hotel & Restaurant

Editor's Note: This location is reported to be under new ownership and therefore this review may contain inaccuracies.

Frugal travelers jump at the opportunity to stay in this tidy, attractive, and inexpensive hotel with air-conditioned rooms and a saltwater swimming pool in Santa Elena, the low-key town adjoining San Ignacio. Aguada became so popular that the owners, a Belizean-American couple, added more rooms overlooking and behind the pool. The original budget rooms have air-conditioning but no televisions. Deluxe rooms with air-conditioning, cable TV, and mini-refrigerators cost more but are still a relative bargain. There's an indoor restaurant and an open-air thatched palapa bar with Belizean dishes and American standards like burgers.